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Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

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Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#61

Post by ale42 »

pjmlp wrote: post #43
esbeeb wrote: post #25

When I use Raspberry Pi OS in a Raspberry Pi 4, 8GB of RAM - I feel I already have an excellent, refreshingly stable , late-90s-era experience. It scratches that strange nostalgia itch for that more innocent experience - of early-times WIMP computing. I can surf the web, edit LibreOffice files, record audio in Audacity on my nice Rode microphone, watch video files in VLC, remotely VNC in, transfer files in and out ov…

Not even close, if you told that about a ESP32 based system then I would have agreed. My 2003 bought multimedia Athlon XP desktop had 512 MB!

The PC I was using in the late 90s had probably 32 MB of RAM after an upgrade... when I built a PC (2001?) with 512 MB it was looking like an infinite amount of RAM...

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#62

Post by p0w3n3d »

cxr wrote: post #37
esbeeb wrote: post #25

When I use Raspberry Pi OS in a Raspberry Pi 4, 8GB of RAM - I feel I already have an excellent, refreshingly stable , late-90s-era experience. It scratches that strange nostalgia itch for that more innocent experience - of early-times WIMP computing. I can surf the web, edit LibreOffice files, record audio in Audacity on my nice Rode microphone, watch video files in VLC, remotely VNC in, transfer files in and out ov…

> 8GB of RAM [...] late-90s-era experience Not even close.

I started my studies on 2003 and highest I could do was 768MB of RAM. I remember this amount exactly, because my LL(1) grammar compiler was leaking memory on my pre-presentation test, and I had to present it to pass the course. Every MB of memory counted, and it started swapping. I was praying to make it pass but when the amount of swap increased above the amount of RAM I gave up. However I was last in the queue to present, and the teacher told me he needs to go, as it was too late. I was so happy I barely could hold my laugh. Came to my dorm and fixed it next day. Core memory. That's how I also fell in love with my wife :D She was doing the extreme programming with me

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#63

Post by jazzyjackson »

devjab wrote: post #57
jimmydoe wrote: post #10

looks delicious. just bought one. Mac binary is not signed, is it intentional? (I'm fine w it not signed but just ask

Don’t you need an Apple developer account to get certificates to sign your stuff? If so that might explain it since that would be… what $300 a year? On top of likely having to go through the whole Apple Store acceptance process.

you don't have to submit apps for them to be signed by you, but you do need to pay 99$/yr, tbh i think it's fair considering xcode is free

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#64

Post by kqr »

tmountain wrote: post #53
kqr wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you – or someone else – write about why Pico-8 is so much better than other fantasy consoles? In particular, I've been intrigued by WASM-4 recently, and someone else mentioned TIC-80 which also looks good. I remember reading about Pyxel and getting inspired. All three of those have the benefit of being free, so why would I pay for Pico-8?

Pay because it’s inexpensive and you are supporting the development of a platform that brings joy to a lot of people (including children). It’s hosted (splore for finding games), a community forum is maintained and is a wealth of knowledge. It’s a hub for learning. Paying for pico-8 is like donating to Wikipedia. Basically, you are putting a few dollars towards a “good thing”.

I don't buy that argument – why shouldn't I donate to TIC-80 instead, since it has the potential of reaching also children whose parents don't have $15 burning a hole in their pockets?

I'm not trying to be contrary, I'm really just trying to find what the unique thing about PICO-8 is since nobody has been able to articulate it, yet many people appear to feel it.

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#65

Post by kqr »

bitwize wrote: post #15

It's a sign of the fact that personal computing has gone way, way off the rails that we make pretend computers to run on our real computers just to have fun ways to compute again. I really really appreciate work like this, but why aren't our actual operating systems "cozy" enough to support creative work anymore?

Because a computer is a general-purpose tool. A computer is not a box made to be cozy and support creative, limited programming work.

If you're looking for specific use-cases, that's exactly what userland software is for. Userland software takes the general computer and converts it to something specific. If you are looking for a cozy environment that supports creative, limited programming work, you run userland software for that!

It's like software-defined networking except software-defined creative environments. Some people prefer Photoshop, and others Picotron. The computer gives you the choice, and userland software is the mechanism by which it does so.

If anything, I'd like to turn your observation around: isn't it marvellous that the same machine allows one person to run Photoshop and another Picotron, with almost no change required to switch between the two environments?

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#66

Post by contrarian1234 »

cabby wrote: post #52
contrarian1234 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used 8GB RAM till recently and I've found it more and more untenable. The primary issue is the browser. Even now on 16GB I restart Firefox every couple of days. But other things also eat RAM like crazy Running Emacs/Cider I'd have to kill other apps and reboot my REPL a couple times a day. Emacs would also leak memory and need a restart every couple of days

'Auto Tab Discard' was a game changer for me using firefox. I was about to upgrade to a 64gb laptop.

it helps but strangely doesn't eliminate the problem entirely

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#67

Post by tmountain »

kqr wrote: post #64
tmountain wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pay because it’s inexpensive and you are supporting the development of a platform that brings joy to a lot of people (including children). It’s hosted (splore for finding games), a community forum is maintained and is a wealth of knowledge. It’s a hub for learning. Paying for pico-8 is like donating to Wikipedia. Basically, you are putting a few dollars towards a “good thing”.

I don't buy that argument – why shouldn't I donate to TIC-80 instead, since it has the potential of reaching also children whose parents don't have $15 burning a hole in their pockets? I'm not trying to be contrary, I'm really just trying to find what the unique thing about PICO-8 is since nobody has been able to articulate it, yet many people appear to feel it.

TIC-80 is heavily inspired by PICO-8. Supporting PICO-8 enables the creator of the original technology to continue producing creative works that seem to inspire a lot of derivative projects. Whatever the case, if you don’t agree, then don’t buy it. It’s pretty simple in that regard.

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#68

Post by contrarian1234 »

prmoustache wrote: post #58
contrarian1234 wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used 8GB RAM till recently and I've found it more and more untenable. The primary issue is the browser. Even now on 16GB I restart Firefox every couple of days. But other things also eat RAM like crazy Running Emacs/Cider I'd have to kill other apps and reboot my REPL a couple times a day. Emacs would also leak memory and need a restart every couple of days

I guess the primary issue is the chair-->keyboard interface. The fact that browsers can open unlimited number of tabs doesn't mean you don't have to do a little housekeeping. Plenty of people still use systems with 4GB and lower and it works fine as long as the number of tabs they open is limited.

The primary issue is that browser developers are people that can afford kitted out Macbook pros so the system isn't designed to scale to small/weak systems :))

I don't believe a browser couldn't be designed to have a small RAM footprint. All my tabs could be suspended and saved to disk when in the background (and not spinning any tasks). They can be read back into RAM near instantly when I tab back to them

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#69

Post by blindluke »

PostOnce wrote: post #30
Toorkit wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Pico-8 is great, but https://tic80.com/ is really cool too.

TIC-80 is cool, but it's a clone of PICO-8, and like Doom clones, some of them are great, but they're still not Doom.

I wholeheartedly agree with you that TIC-80 is not as great as PICO-8 is, and I would never recommend it over PICO-8 to someone who wants to start their adventure with game development.

But it is not a clone of PICO-8. It offers a resolution that's very similar to that of the Game Boy Advance, so it serves as a nice transition stage towards GBA development. You can then enjoy your games on a console like Anbernic RG351P that's optimized for GBA games (2x integer scaling, same screen ratio). It's a specific use case, but one where TIC-80 shines.

Re: Picotron Is a Fantasy Workstation

#70

Post by cabby »

contrarian1234 wrote: post #66
cabby wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'Auto Tab Discard' was a game changer for me using firefox. I was about to upgrade to a 64gb laptop.

it helps but strangely doesn't eliminate the problem entirely

Perhaps I don't see it on 32gb but can relate with cider/emacs.
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