Recent posts

#91

Software / Re: I'm currently analyzing th...

Last post by ptek - Sep 28, 2026, 01:18 AM

When I was trying to find the VESA VBE code in the OS4.2 patched kernel the Darwin 0.3 kernel sources helped me a lot.

#92

Software / Resurrecting NeXTmail and/or n...

Last post by Rhetorica - Sep 27, 2026, 11:35 PM

Mail was always a cornerstone of NeXT's marketing pitches, but NeXTmail definitely does not work anymore. From skimming NeXTanswers, I get the impression that this may be partially ameliorated with a new build of sendmail, but there are clearly other issues that would need to be addressed.

Has anyone had any luck (or even just daydreams) about working on this? Bonus points if you've considered porting the improved MailViewer app from Rhapsody or 4.0PR1 to OS4.2.

#93

Software / Re: NetSurf for OPENSTEP

Last post by jade_nekotenshi - Sep 27, 2026, 06:21 PM

Fantastic, I'm gonna have to try it out!

#94

Virtualization / Re: NeXTSTEP (& OpenSTEP) in 8...

Last post by jade_nekotenshi - Sep 27, 2026, 04:47 PM

For NeXTSTEP 3.3, the video card of choice in 86box is the S3 Vision 864 (not the 964, though that works in OPENSTEP). In OPENSTEP 4.2, choose the Matrox Millennium 8MB for the widest range of modes.

The VBE 2.0 driver will work with the 3dfx Voodoo3, but with a limited range of modes, all in 8-bit color - stick with the Matrox Millennium.

I'll have to test network again, but I think 86box does now support a working card under NS 3.3.

#95

Software / Re: New apps - SSH client, IRC...

Last post by jade_nekotenshi - Sep 27, 2026, 03:45 PM

StepSSH is currently not working on 68k. I'll release an updated version once it does work. For right now the status is:

x86 - Working
68k - Not Working
SPARC - Untested

EDIT:

After the patch, we're now at:

x86 - Working
68k - Working
SPARC - Untested

#96

Software / Re: I'm currently analyzing th...

Last post by onionmixer - Sep 27, 2026, 12:57 PM

That's great. Every bit of effort teaches all of us something. It's super cool you're sharing your progress!

Don't mention it... the project will only truly matter if I can see it through to the end. Even if it takes a while, I'll keep pushing through

#97

Software / Re: I'm currently analyzing th...

Last post by onionmixer - Sep 27, 2026, 12:56 PM

We actually have a source tree for an earlier version of NEXTSTEP (3.x). It is mostly complete, though there are some files that got damaged or lost during archival due to filename truncation. This includes kernel source. For various reasons it cannot be distributed publicly.

Once you get to the validation stage, I can send you a copy of these kernel files for further comparison. I expect that many of the differences between 4.2 and Darwin 0.1 will have attestations in the 3.x source.

Please keep us updated on your progress! This is really cool!

Ooh... now that's some interesting news. I'll give it a solid shot. I completely understand for whatever reason

As a side note... while writing VGA drivers (Matrox previously, and now Radeon), I've gotten a rough idea of how VRAM and window managers work under the hood. To be honest... what I'd love to try next is something like reading the window manager's draw buffer and handling it remotely—maybe building something that handles the RDP protocol instead of VNC? I've been kicking that idea around a bit.... Though honestly... I'm still not entirely sure yet

#98

General Discussion / Re: Thoughts on AI usage for r...

Last post by stepleton - Sep 27, 2026, 11:39 AM

The participation-magnifying effects of AI on the NeXT community are also found in the Apple Lisa community, where there has been a similar process of reckoning. My contribution is here. But I'll quote the excerpt that seems most general (and it also shows why my NeXT interest is a bit less fervent than my other retrocomputing pursuits, despite my lingering here):

To me, I like the old computers I collect (my Lisas, the PERQ, the Tektronix vector-display machines, the transputer setup, etc.) because they feel like windows into a different universe where a different set of ideas took off to the ones we know today. When I use or write code for these computers, I'm often trying to imagine being in that universe and seeing what it's like. I collected a few NeXT machines in the late '90s with that same "what if" speculative enthusiasm. Then OS X took off and NeXTs became a lot less interesting to me. We found out the answer to "what if" --- it's this universe where we are right now!

For now, AI coding doesn't trade so much in "what if". If you have a program idea in mind for the Lisa, it will just go straight ahead and make it, overcoming any obstacle or point of incongruence between your idea and the underlying libraries and tooling. But those obstacles are traces of the realities, preferences, and philosophies that made the Lisa what it was when it was introduced. The people who created the Office System imagined a computer that worked in a certain way, and the ecosystem that they started would have evolved with those visions as a major influence. (Of course those visions were "wrong" --- that's at the root of why the Lisa failed. But what if?)

If I make a Lisa program, I want to run into those frictions that come from 40 years of divergent history and not being on the same wavelength. I want to try to get into its designers' heads. I want to have those moments of "so that's why it's this way". I think this kind of understanding is really helpful to trying to make something that would be a convincing "what if" Lisa program from, say, 1985. Could I do this kind of exploration by using AI to code? I actually think I could! But I'd have to be pretty careful to rein in the AI and keep it patient and "true" to the feel of the experience, and to allow me to discover along with it. AI coding agents are not made for patience --- they are built to go relentlessly and just get it done, no matter what "it" is. So you need to do work if you want to ride along with them on the scenic route.

Of course, that's my own preference and my own kind of enjoyment: it's not for everyone! And it won't take long to count the number of Lisa programs I've made since the dawn of capable coding agents: just one, my LisaVox demo, which I did by hand for the fun of it. And that was January. Coding agents have got a whole lot better in the eight months since then!

I'm totally in favour of people chasing their own pleasure and visions for Lisa programs and capabilities. AI systems have clearly revolutionised this: we went from maybe one or two Office System programs per decade to, like, ten in the past few months. People are dusting off plans and hatching schemes for more, and AI is making it possible. That's great! The only thing I'll say is that these new plans are inevitably going to evolve the ecosystem. @bmwcyclist's new utilities are great examples of this: they're setting up ways that people manage files on Lisas, and at some point they may become a big part of the "standard way to do it". Are these approaches the standards we want to wind up with? What are their pros and cons? I'm not hinting either way; I really have no opinion at the moment. What I would say though out of naked personal interest is that I hope we don't evolve in a way that makes it more difficult to achieve my "what if" fantasies someday. I have a few ideas for how that might happen (e.g. new convenience and interoperability libraries that start to subsume the original ones offered by the OS/ToolKit/Office System), but I've gone on long enough, I think! If anyone has read this far, I hope it's been interesting...

#99

Software / Re: New apps - SSH client, IRC...

Last post by jade_nekotenshi - Sep 27, 2026, 02:36 AM

If you grab the sources for StepSSH and build it on x86, edit the Makefile.openstep and add "-m486" to the OPT flags - it considerably increases throughput. I'm not sure if -m68040 makes any difference on black hardware or not - I'm testing that now.

EDIT: On 68k, set "-O2 -fomit-frame-pointer -m68040", but your throughput still won't be great. Note that -O2, on x86, actually is slower than -O. I'm not sure what flags make the most sense on SPARC.

#100

General Discussion / Re: Thoughts on AI usage for r...

Last post by ZombiePhysicist - Sep 27, 2026, 01:09 AM

3 comments.

First, bully. Here here. 3 Cheers and all that. Well done.

Second:

"(This is where I'd insert some boilerplate acknowledging the suffering of Alex Perez, whose work on the ZuluSCSI firmware was appropriated by the BlueSCSI team without due credit or compensation. Some scumbags don't need a God in a Box to express their scumbag-nature.)"

While I agree with the above, I'll note any prior tsk-tsk snark directed at someone's "save the @" are now declared null and void!

Third:
AI is a tool. It can be used to create abhorrent disastrous problems. And it can be used by good. Most time its the character and intentions of the people that wield it that matter most. It's not a right or a wrong, it's a design choice, and as most design choices, they come with pros and cons, that are best left to the characters wielding the tools.

TLDR, agreed.