Fest 99/4ATX (Austin, TX) Weekend August 9 to August 11, 2019

[Albert]

I ended up staying the whole day (up until dinner) at Fest 99/4ATX yesterday and it was a blast!  It was a pleasure meeting everyone who attended, and I learned quite about about various TI computers, peripherals, and prototypes.  Look forward to participating again next year!

 

It was also fun seeing the ATX Hackerspace, as I had never been there before.

 

 ..Al

[+OLD CS1]

42 minutes ago, Albert said:

I ended up staying the whole day (up until dinner) at Fest 99/4ATX yesterday and it was a blast!  It was a pleasure meeting everyone who attended, and I learned quite about about various TI computers, peripherals, and prototypes.  Look forward to participating again next year!

 

It was also fun seeing the ATX Hackerspace, as I had never been there before.

 

 ..Al

 

Indeed!  You seem so much more human after meeting you

[Albert]

2 minutes ago, OLD CS1 said:

Indeed!  You seem so much more human after meeting you

LOL, I'm not sure how to take that! 

 

 ..Al

[Albert]

@FarmerPotato Please let me know when things are winding down today.  I can come down and grab the 1702s so you don't have to worry about bringing them home.

 

 ..Al

[+FarmerPotato]

1 hour ago, FarmerPotato said:

Amanda and I are here. There are donuts and ice. Just cleaning up for a bit. Will set up video on the soldering table.

 

Still at https://zoom.us/j/7707370625

 

The camera will point at soldering of a FlashRom, and 3d printing .. suddenly I can't find any 3d files for our stuff

The camera is on 3d printing but the microphone is in the classroom.

 

[+FarmerPotato]

30 minutes ago, Albert said:

@FarmerPotato Please let me know when things are winding down today.  I can come down and grab the 1702s so you don't have to worry about bringing them home.

 

 ..Al

I think we will be ok with 3 less monitors! We used them last night, but there are only 4 people here today.

 

The HDTV turns out to be semi-ok for TI composite out. It does weird things with the pixels. a scrolling checkerboard of 4x4 pixel squares somehow turns into little trapezoids.

 

[Albert]

54 minutes ago, FarmerPotato said:

I think we will be ok with 3 less monitors! We used them last night, but there are only 4 people here today.

 

The HDTV turns out to be semi-ok for TI composite out. It does weird things with the pixels. a scrolling checkerboard of 4x4 pixel squares somehow turns into little trapezoids.

I don't want to come grab the monitors if anyone is using them (or might use them).  I'll send you a PM with my number..

 

 ..Al

[+hloberg]

1 hour ago, Albert said:

I don't want to come grab the monitors if anyone is using them (or might use them).  I'll send you a PM with my number..

 

 ..Al

I asked FarmerPotato to send me my monitor cable & power supply I accidentally left. So one of the 1702 still has a home made monitor cable plugged to the front and a power supply plugged in the wall next to it. that ones mine. HLO

[+FarmerPotato]

2 hours ago, FarmerPotato said:

The camera is on 3d printing but the microphone is in the classroom.

 

we are back talking  about fbForth now.

[+hloberg]

some pictures. I'll post more on my Atariage blog in a little while & Twitter.

 

 

[+hloberg]

posted some pics on my Twitter:

https://twitter.com/scribehlo/

[+hloberg]

On 8/9/2019 at 5:48 PM, --- Ω --- said:

Look what I spied during the setup process...

I enjoyed demoing my game for everyone. I still have a few for sale. PM me if you want one.

PS farmerPotato, you get your 2600 running after I left? 

[spiffster]

So, yeah... Meet Clarence, the unofficial Fest 99/4ATX mascot.

Edited August 11, 2019 by spiffster

[Omega-TI]

46 minutes ago, hloberg said:

I enjoyed demoing my game for everyone. I still have a few for sale. PM me if you want one.

PS farmerPotato, you get your 2600 running after I left? 

I could not use it as I don't have an Atari 2600.  Now if you ever make a version for the Atari 5200 drop me a PM.

[+hloberg]

2 minutes ago, --- Ω --- said:

I could not use it as I don't have an Atari 2600.  Now if you ever make a version for the Atari 5200 drop me a PM.

on my to do list.

[+hloberg]

posted some of the files from the 2 CDs I gave out at the ATX. It's from DISK 1; the MAME stuff minus most of MAME and minus the documentation (I would have gone over the max for atariage files). the next blog post is the oueeygui and the fusion BBS.

 

 

[Albert]

I'm heading back over there now. Hopefully someone is still there!!

 

  ..Al

[+hloberg]

3 hours ago, spiffster said:

So, yeah... Meet Clarence, the unofficial Fest 99/4ATX mascot.

I was wondering what that thing was on the shelf.

[+hloberg]

for those who got my CDs or downloading the info from my Atariage blog I found an error I thought I fixed in the batch setup in the 99/2. when the 99/2 starts it's in the partial emulation mode of MAME. SO if you press the P key the screen will dim and the emulator will PAUSE. to fix this press SCRLOCK after starting the 99/2 then TAB. it seems to be a bug only in 99/2. 

[+mizapf]

Is it in your batch file only? When I start the TI-99/2 emulation, I am in full mode; i.e. when I press P on the title screen, I get to the selection screen immediately.

[+hloberg]

3 hours ago, mizapf said:

Is it in your batch file only? When I start the TI-99/2 emulation, I am in full mode; i.e. when I press P on the title screen, I get to the selection screen immediately.

batch file run. here is the batch file I created to run it. only seems to happen in the 99/2. same batch setup for 99/8 doesn't happen.

fyi: @capson in the script is just a vbscript to turn the capslock on and off. it's in all the batch files.

everything I gave out except MAME itself and the .PDF files in this file from my blog.

Note: If you see a reference to MESS instead of MAME I found a site were a guy is recompiling MAME and putting the top drop down menu back and calling it MESS. It's looks to be about the latest version of MAME. I'm using it some of the systems. If I find a problem, I then just use the official MAME.

 

ti99-232.bat

Edited August 12, 2019 by hloberg
update

[+FarmerPotato]

To everyone who attended in person (or online)

 

You truly made the event a success. It's not about the hardware, it is about the people.

 

We get more out of our hobby when we can share it.  Having people meet in person, is invaluable.

 

Every one of you who had a conversation at 99/4ATX: you were essential to the meeting. I think the 11 people we had on Saturday was the perfect number. Though 12 would also have been perfect too if InsaneMultitasker had made it.

 

Also, I did not realize that Albert IS AtariAge. (Somehow I thought there was more than one Admin!) We were lucky to have him (he brought us monitors and decals too). 

 

A shout-out to ArcadeShopper who speedily mailed us 3 new composite cables.

 

I underestimated how much effort it takes to run an event. Some stuff didn't work out right, but I still didn't hear any complaints? Please give us polite constructive suggestions  

 

Amanda did a tremendous amount, on publicity, trying to keep me focused on logistics, running errands, making the room clean and presentable, polishing-packing-and-setting-up computers, snacks, food, coffee. Not to mention her support for my time-consuming and money-sucking hobby, and doing surface mount soldering for me

 

Thank you to those at the end who helped me pack up all the stuff. It would have taken me hours longer to pack up without OLD CS1 and spiffster and Rob.

 

I am definitely planning on repeating this event, with more publicity and advance planning. 

 

On Sunday we discussed how to increase the number of TI-99/4A gatherings around the US, by co-locating with events like KansasFest (several AtariAge members attended!), VCF Midwest/Emergency Commodore, VCF SouthEast, etc. Inviting the original programmers to the larger events. I would also add CypherCon in Milwaukee,  which precedes Midwest Gaming Classic.

 

Formal presentations from shift838 and hloberg. I'm happy that we also spent most of the time in small groups. 

 

To those who tuned in online: I regret the video conferencing was not organized to make recordings of presentations. Perhaps in the future we can delegate to a person in charge of video. 

 

Personally, it warms my heart that GuruSantiago had a student eager to learn 99/4 assembler. And spiffster took to learning fbFORTH. (Spiffster, your $20 for the fbFORTH cart was generous, but I can't keep it, must send it on to the author Lee Stewart.)

GuruSantiago won the raffle for Dragon's Lair. The raffle was done with TI Basic. 

 

I'll sign off with my imagined blooper reel. Let's agree to laugh about it and move on?

• Official 99/4ATX  512K cartridges are on a slow boat on the Pacific Ocean. I'll let you know when they show up.
• The 99/2 caught on fire (not really, but it has a bad power cap 4700 uF)
• I misplaced my Geneve keyboard. Kinda useless.
• The 99/4s in storage were both dead.
• The Atari 2600 power supply from Game Over was broken. The transformer was probably fine, but we chopped the cord and made it really dead.
• Zoom URLs I screwed up, and how the meeting terminated every 40 minutes.
• Luke's CF7+ got fried somehow.
• The LAN ports were non funzione, but wireless was ok.
• Trying to make audio, RF, power cables on the spot.
• Kye had to play TI Invaders with keyboard, because we never got around to testing the joysticks.
• The TI talking clown is going to cause nightmares, and come back next year speaking French or German. (Update: Le Clown Magique is on the way.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-_UTbMT1AZM&t=3s

 

But I think we had lots of fun.

 

[+mizapf]

5 hours ago, hloberg said:

batch file run. here is the batch file I created to run it. only seems to happen in the 99/2. same batch setup for 99/8 doesn't happen.

fyi: @capson in the script is just a vbscript to turn the capslock on and off. it's in all the batch files.

everything I gave out except MAME itself and the .PDF files in this file from my blog.

Note: If you see a reference to MESS instead of MAME I found a site were a guy is recompiling MAME and putting the top drop down menu back and calling it MESS. It's looks to be about the latest version of MAME. I'm using it some of the systems. If I find a problem, I then just use the official MAME.

 

The MESS with pull down menus (MESSUI, MAMEUI) is maintained by a single person (AntoPISA), and it is, as far as I remember, a Windows-only feature.

 

As for the issue with the partial mode: Try to set readconfig or writeconfig to 0 in mame.ini. Maybe some unwanted setting has been saved. As I said, and I pulled the latest release just now and retried under Linux, the emulation always starts for me in full mode. I'll check it under Windows.

 

[+hloberg]

20 minutes ago, mizapf said:

 

The MESS with pull down menus (MESSUI, MAMEUI) is maintained by a single person (AntoPISA), and it is, as far as I remember, a Windows-only feature.

 

As for the issue with the partial mode: Try to set readconfig or writeconfig to 0 in mame.ini. Maybe some unwanted setting has been saved. As I said, and I pulled the latest release just now and retried under Linux, the emulation always starts for me in full mode. I'll check it under Windows.

 

UI_ACTIVE got turned on in the .ini. I remember fiddling with the batch file and set that to on but removed the line. but the ui_active switch stayed on in the .ini. I did set readconfig & writeconfig to 0 but that didn't help it from reading the ui_active switch as on.

so i just erased the .ini file and let it recreate it and that fixed the problem. I could have just changed the switch in the .ini but easier to just erase the file. I'm going to post that as the fix. in other words, my bad. ?

 

[+hloberg]

19 hours ago, hloberg said:

for those who got my CDs or downloading the info from my Atariage blog I found an error I thought I fixed in the batch setup in the 99/2. when the 99/2 starts it's in the partial emulation mode of MAME. SO if you press the P key the screen will dim and the emulator will PAUSE. to fix this press SCRLOCK after starting the 99/2 then TAB. it seems to be a bug only in 99/2. 

UPDATE!!!! if you got the CD saturday from me erase the ti99_232.ini from the INI directory to fix this issue. the problem is the ui_active got turned ON in the .ini but never turned off. erasing the .ini fixes the issue.