This Week in FujiNet – the first issue.
There is so much going on with the FujiNet project these days I thought I’d take a moment and begin to track some of the bigger developments that are happening every day on the Discord server. This will provide a useful recap for people that may not be on the Discord Server all the time. I am usually there and contributing this way seems like it can fill a gap that can help document and alert interested people of updated and changes on a weekly basis. So this summary is a condensed run down of what has been going on for the past week with links out to any interesting projects, videos, or specific things that caught my interest. Enjoy.
You can find more info at these locations:
FujiNet Flasher is here – keep your FN up2date.
Videos
Retro Repair Roundup #15 – Talking FujiNet with Thomas Cherryhomes – Thom and Jeff are live on the Roundup talking about FujiNet and Apples. Almost every aspect of the FN was discussed here and it’s worth watching for the history and breakdown of FN on the Apple II platform.
RetroShack – Is this the best Atari 8 bit peripheral ever made? I think it might just be! – a nice and complete review of the FujiNet on the Atari platform. RS goes over all the function of the FN for Atari.
Platform Updates
Atari 8bit
> POC work continues on 8bit hub integration with FN- using the FN to host large multi-player games via virtual hub over TCP/IP.
The investigations are around some of the work done for 8bit-Unity Project which is working on a comprehensive Game SDK for 80’s computers. Discussion about DLIs and SIO ensued.
> Schadret continues work on investigation and updating the UI of CONFIG for Atari. Playing with better filtering and better displaying loooong filenames. A work in progress but amazing work that will make CONFIG even easier to use.
> bocianu released a brand new chat client for Atari supporting FN of course. it’s available on his TNFS server at: https://fujinet.pl/tnfs/networking/fujitalk.xex
FujiTalk requires the latest firmware:
"version": "0.5.fd038d41",
"version_date": "2022-06-05 01:37:38",
"build_date": "2022-06-08 18:27:12",
"description": "Fix HTTP auth bug, add UDPStream webui stop button",
"git_commit": "fd038d41",
"url": "https://fujinet.online/firmware/releases_atari/fujinet-ATARI-0.5.fd038d41.zip",
"sha256": "c280c03dc92765942432f80a369f34601e999970925dbc3970f40544b28941a7"
AppleII
So much is going on with Apple that this is only the smallest recap!
> JeffP released a FujiNet Apple Rev 0 Dev Board Spec – outlining what the first physical FN for AppleII could look like.
> mozzwald used that doc and is completing the first design of the real physical FN board for AppleII! No more Devkits or FN v1.0 needed.
- Is this the 4th Physical FujiNet device?
> Discussion with Dean Claxton about FN on his Apple2 cards – internal FN compatible cards for Apple2 owners with slots.
> JeffP has SPI writes to SmartPort working and re-integrated into master branch on FN.
the difference between apple2good and spi operation is that with spi, the FN holds the RD line LOW all the time unless transmitting data. The old way, RD was left floating by FN when not in use. I think this will be fixed with the -125 buffer we’re adding to the dev board.
> TCH & Jeff have begun to use SmartPort as a character device! – This hasn’t been done before as far as I know. “The character mode calls are DOCUMENTED in the FIRMWARE MANUAL.” – TCH
>> TCH was able to implement a N: network device for Apple – and it’s mounted as a smart port device by the Apple.
>> TCH released netcat for Apple2 and FN
>> TCH released a working ISS tracker for Apple! – https://github.com/FujiNetWIFI/fujinet-apps/tree/master/iss-tracker/apple2
- The FN Network Device appears on the SmartPort Bus enumeration for AppleIIc (it's there as UNIT 7)
- ISS tracker on Jeff's Apple2 is tracking the ISS via FN and JSON
Atari 16bit
>sjfroos continues his work into getting FN on a ACSI buss interface for the ST. Working on some compilation for Atari side needs as the hardware begins to take shape. He’s looking to build some software in C natively on the ST.
Atari software side needs:
- Boot sector
- Fujinet.sys – drivers
- Config.sys – ST variant of fujinet-config
- Printer spooler
- optional: fujinet.acc – fujinet-config as acc
- ESP32 connected to AtariSCSI interface and then onto the ST
ZX Spectrum
> thweasel leads the way (with support from That Old Nerd ) for connecting up the ESP32 to a parallel buss interface for the Spectrum family. The setup is way more complex that the serial solutions done on the other platforms.
- actual FN commands being read by the ZX, via the debug output on ESP32 device
- reading FN command stream on the ZX itself
- Parallel bus setup needs more wires
Lynx
> moz has received and built the very first physical FNs for Lynx. They use the commLynx port to pull down games, and since the FN acts like a commLynx device – games that natively use commLynx for dual-play just work. Multiple network games via FN have been played by Moz and TCH to date. This is the third physical FN device (after the Atari and ADAM devices).
- the Moz Lynx - sportin a refurbed screen, custom cart for loading games and the longest commLynx cable in the world, via FN
- the Lynx FujiNet, encased and ready for Lynx
ADAM
It’s been pretty quiet on the ADAM for the past week. Moz has been trying to do virtual printing from ADAM. Discussion about a recent run of more SGMs for the Colecovision and ADAM (adds sounds and extra gfx to games).
Wrap-Up
Whew that was a lot. I hope next week is just as productive, but at the same time I hope I can keep up with all of this. I’m off to try the new Atari Chat App from bocianu.
Thanks for the updates! I have two for the Atari and looking forward to developments for the Sinclair.