Classic99 Updates

[+OLD CS1]

I have an H: drive, which is mapped on all of my computers and "Available Offline," for a share on my NAS.  The big thing is making sure things are consistent between stations (file paths, &c., no big deal.)  Everything is under "H:\classic99".

[RXB]

On 6/26/2022 at 8:50 PM, Tursi said:

I didn't touch the GROM support. Give me a step by step to reproduce or there's nothing I can do.

 

 

[Tursi]

11 hours ago, RXB said:

Yea you run it in ROOT DIRECTORY, I run it from DOCUMENTS or Program files same as I would if in a business.

The fact that Windows changes file permissions on Documents is beyond stupid, millions of people complain about this but Microsoft refuses to fix this.

Linux and Unix do not have this problem.

"Yet". Linux and Unix are doing their best to catch up with stupid too.

 

[+OLD CS1]

21 hours ago, RXB said:

Documents is beyond stupid, millions of people complain about this but Microsoft refuses to fix this.

Linux and Unix do not have this problem.

Just going to say that millions of people are doing it wrong. There are a number of unprivileged directories from which executables should never run. Solaris has for a couple of decades, at least, had protections against running binaries from /tmp or any other filesystem you want (like web site directories) to prevent exploitation and compromise.  Google exploited this weakness in Windows to bypass administrative restrictions on installing software, and now everyone does, including ransomware. Yes, Microsoft violates this rule, but Windows checks for MS signatures before doing so, for better or worse.

[RXB]

The registry that Microsoft uses is the stupidest worst idea ever. 

This comes up with Google or Bing or Yahoo:

 

"The real problem with the registry is that it was exposed to the outside world. Instead of being a secure, central hive for only the most essential and global settings, over time the registry has slowly become a trash heap of miscellaneous junk settings for every rinky-dink application on the planet." 

Aug 28, 2007

[jrhodes]

Linux does not have a equivalent of the registry, but trying to edit dconf to do what you need or want is sometimes no better.

[+mizapf]

When I think about ~/.local/ and ~/.config/, I could awake in the middle of the night, sweating. But I'm better not telling you.

[GDMike]

7 hours ago, RXB said:

The registry that Microsoft uses is the stupidest worst idea ever. 

This comes up with Google or Bing or Yahoo:

 

"The real problem with the registry is that it was exposed to the outside world. Instead of being a secure, central hive for only the most essential and global settings, over time the registry has slowly become a trash heap of miscellaneous junk settings for every rinky-dink application on the planet." 

Aug 28, 2007

There's nothing closed, secret, hidden, protected, invisible, privleged etc..

 

[+OLD CS1]

8 hours ago, RXB said:

The registry that Microsoft uses is the stupidest worst idea ever.

Stipulating this opinion, it is still not what we are discussing.

[+TheBF]

9 hours ago, RXB said:

The registry that Microsoft uses is the stupidest worst idea ever. 

This comes up with Google or Bing or Yahoo:

 

"The real problem with the registry is that it was exposed to the outside world. Instead of being a secure, central hive for only the most essential and global settings, over time the registry has slowly become a trash heap of miscellaneous junk settings for every rinky-dink application on the planet." 

Aug 28, 2007

I have used CCleaner for a long time. It regularly finds crap in the registry and removes it. 

I save the pre-cleaned registry file just in case.

Seem to keep the machine working ok. 

[GDMike]

Takes me about an hour and a half to reimage win10, install printer, classic 99, office 2007, adobe pro, restore my docs, install my tape software, (novastorbackup), map my drives,  install chrome, and then I spend another half hour with power settings, turning off unwanted BS like live weather and other windows crapola and doing updates. But again, I've been doing that for 33 years for large organizations and I find it simple, easy, and resolves most issues.

Of course this is if you have time and just don't feel like hammering out the fix for a problem.

But depending on the issue, you could end up with the same problem afterwards, especially with bad drivers, permissions or bad hardware to name a couple.

I suggest having a dedicated laptop just for classic 99.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 30, 2022 by GDMike

[Keatah]

1 hour ago, TheBF said:

I have used CCleaner for a long time.

CCleaner is instrumental in keeping one of my dot-com era XP rigs in top shape. Mainly use it to debloat the exhaust from lazy proggies and keep things tidy. A key feature is adding your own list of temporary folders and crap like so.

 

It's reassuring to see that the bi-annual runs tend to accumulate the same outgassings time and time again. So that proves it's working. Remember, it's about space savings and not gaining that mythical 500% speed gain so often advertised back then.

[Keatah]

10 hours ago, RXB said:

The registry that Microsoft uses is the stupidest worst idea ever. 

I believe the registry should only be for the OS shell itself. And I strongly prefer (and use) individual .ini files per-application whenever possible.

 

Proper compartmentalization is a good thing. And by doing so I've had great success with emulators across the board since the 1990's.

Edited June 30, 2022 by Keatah

[Tursi]

I haven't done a performance-related re-install since Win2k came out. Are you guys sure you're not abusing your systems?

 

 

[jenorton]

Hi:

 

I'd like to say thanks again for making Classic99 the great stand-alone emulator it is!

 

The improvements to the speech system alone are amazing.

 

You have a setting in Classic99.ini "enableAltF4".  As a blind user, this is very helpful, because it enables me to exit the emulator without using my screen reader's function to route the mouse pointer to the menu and doing a virtual left click on the "File" menu, thence going to Exit.

 

However, once the menu comes up, the keyboard works quite well, and the screen reader reads the menu and other dialogs quite well.

 

Do you think you might be able to put in a similar keystroke, maybe only enabled if requested in the .ini file, (same as the "enableAltF4" option to avoid any potential conflict), to actually bring up the menus?  Again, this would give a blind user a quick way to enable the menu without the extra work with the screen reader.

 

I ask this since Classic99 is actually the most screen reader accessible ti 99/4A emulator out there. 

 

I can use MAMEUI with the menu option enabled, but, again, have to use the screen reader's fake mouse functions to accomplish the first click to bring up its menus as well.

 

I realize this is probably something that most (if not all) other users wouldn't think about, but, I figure the "enableAltF4" setting is not used by a lot of folks either, as for a sighted person, it's pretty simple to just do the mouse clicks and be done with it.

 

Anyway, this is not a show stopper.

 

Introducing new code can introduce unforeseen problems at times, so maybe caution is still needed.

 

Anyway, thanks for all the great advances to Classic99.  It's obviously a program which has stood the test of time.

[Tursi]

Enable Alt-F4 was added for the standalone mode (in particular for Realms of Antiquity, which uses Classic99 as just an engine.) A number of other keys are configurable for that mode, so adding one more probably won't hurt.

 

I thought F10 was the default key for opening the menu, but I see it's inconsistent. After a bit of fiddling, I think I have it working with "EnableF10Menu" as the new option.

 

 

[Tursi]

Classic99 399.060

 

- added 'EnableF10Menu' option to the Classic99.ini (Emulation). When set to 1, F10 will activate the Windows menu.

 

http://harmlesslion.com/software/classic99

 

Note that my web script seems to be broken at the moment, so I couldn't update the version number on my website. Double check after download.

 

[jenorton]

Thanks a bunch!

 

Works like a champ.

 

Now to post on a couple blindness-related lists.

 

This is amazing!

 

 

Thanks again!

[Tursi]

Classic99 399.061

- added experimental screen reader

- updated manual

 

I started this with the previous update, but wasn't sure when I would be able to finish it. This offers a screen reader to the emulator.

 

Press: 
- Control F4 to read the screen.
- Control F9 to toggle a continuous reading mode.
- Control F10 to abort current speech.

 

These three settings are also in the menu under Options->Screen Reader.

 

This is experimental and not 100%, but... I think I got it pretty good. I don't know if it's useful.

 

It will attempt not to read out graphics - but since often graphics are generated from redefined characters, sometimes it can't tell. That's why the abort is there, in case it's taking too long reading out letters and numbers. It can read graphics mode, text mode, and 80 column text mode. It uses the ASCII character values, it doesn't attempt to perform any kind of recognition on the character patterns.

 

Continuous mode is an experiment where it will attempt to only read NEW text, as it appears. It tries to accomodate scrolling as well. I tested it in BASIC, Editor/Assembler, and the Demonstration cart (it does pretty well on most screens on the Demonstration cart and reasonably well in BASIC ). Once turned on, continuous mode is saved in the INI and will remember its setting.

 

The one thing I was not quite sure how to do was to get the system default voice. I think the fact that Classic99 is built for Windows XP, and I am on Windows 11, means that the API and the way settings are saved has changed. At this point, the voice it comes up with is the voice you've got... although I was able to change it in the registry.

 

Anyway, @jenorton, I think we talked about something like this a long time ago, and I finally wanted to give it a shot.

 

http://harmlesslion.com/software/classic99
 

[digdugnate]

Thanks from this lurker for the long-time support you've given to this!  I love seeing all the things that change and get added to Classic99.

Edited July 10, 2022 by digdugnate

[GDMike]

On 6/9/2022 at 12:04 AM, PeteE said:

Thanks! This fixes the debugger flickering under wine too.

I was experimenting with raspberry 4 and twister.

I was able to simply run WINE and setup classic 99.

I was then able to run FB Forth and TurboForth but both could not run at 80 column modes. Both gave me a stare, as if to say, what do you want? Lol, as in they both stayed in their default modes and calling 2 MODE just gave me a black TI screen and lock up.

 

I used the same settings as I would in windows 11 and 10 and 7.

 

BUT..I won't be using the raspberry pi and wine with classic 99 anyway, but I thought I'd mention it in case someone else was.

 

I think windows does well enough on my laptop for what I need..

 

 

 

Edited July 10, 2022 by GDMike

[atrax27407]

I have encountered a problem with Vn 061. The title screen appears but when I press a key to begin, nothing happens. Is Vn .060 still available?

 

Strange - it works fine if I go into the folder on drive C and select the .exe file but it will not work from a shortcut on the desktop -- annoying!

Edited July 10, 2022 by atrax27407

[atrax27407]

Strange -- now it is working for some reason.

[jenorton]

Wow!

 

This is the biggest shock I had since ... well, I don't know!

 

What more can I say.

 

This is absolutely the most amazing thing!  I'm actually getting instant speech feedback from the TI!

 

Ok, let me stop gushing for a minute.

 

I am actually running on an insider build of Windows 11 right now, and it isn't any different from Win 10.

 

Thing with the speech API is that there are 2 of them.

 

The newest one, called OneCore, I believe is the one most folks here when they bring up Narrator, or load NVDA (Non-Visual Desktop Access)--I think that's what it means.

 

Anyway, the one you're using, which has been around a lot longer is called SAPI.

 

Anyway, to change the default sspeech for that one, you can use the option in control panel called "Change Text-to-Speech Settings".  One has to go into control panel and do it, and, unlike the newer setting, you need to click Apply or OK to save the settings.

 

The SAPI mode is quite all right--there are a lot more voices available and it'll work on older systems such as Win 7, so this is the best option, imho.  There are ways to query the SAPI system and allow selection of voice, speed, and some other things from within an application, but, changing the default voice is easy once you get the hang of it.

 

I know this is experimental, so I understand the rough spots.  If you want, I'll play with it and see what happens and try to figure out what kinds of things work.

 

In playing with Basic, it seems to do pretty well.  Some times, it repeats earlier lines, but, it seems to be easy to figure out.  Got to try more things--like writing some programs.  Bet mine will work ok, since I'm only a rudimentary BASIC programmer and don't do anything fancy with the screen.

 

In the Scott Adams adventures, it's repeating a few more things, but, I think I'll get the hang of it.  I see I can't just get the dragon.

 

Tried Hitchhiker's Guide, and it wants to read the entire screen each time I do something.  Bet it's because the interpreter does direct memory writes instead of using the same routines that would be in Basic or XB, so your routine isn't sure what's changed.  This has always been tricky for screen readers anyway.  In the old days, most of them just stayed quiet as they only used BIOS calls (talking about the DOS days).  Yours is at least talking and it gets around to it.

 

However, these are my first impressions, and, I totally understand this is your first stab at this.

 

Boy, I've got something to really play with.

 

I'm kind-of glad I waited to post on any of the blindness-related lists yet.  I'd have had to post again to talk about this.

 

I'm already learning more than I have in a long time!

 

Thanks for making my day!

[Tursi]

On 7/10/2022 at 6:12 AM, GDMike said:

I was experimenting with raspberry 4 and twister.

I was able to simply run WINE and setup classic 99.

I was then able to run FB Forth and TurboForth but both could not run at 80 column modes. Both gave me a stare, as if to say, what do you want? Lol, as in they both stayed in their default modes and calling 2 MODE just gave me a black TI screen and lock up.

You probably have either F18A disabled or Enable 80 Column Hack disabled. Look under options.