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Counterpoint: a Raspberry Pi 4 is more open and infinitely better documented than the Apple IIe/II+ computers I learned BASIC on in the early 80’s. There was ac

Counterpoint: a Raspberry Pi 4 is more open and infinitely better documented than the Apple IIe/II+ computers I learned BASIC on in the early 80’s. There was actually lots of great printed documentation for the Apple II, but you had to actually find it. And it was not easy to find it, and it was expensive to buy it, and you couldn’t buy much of it if you were of limited means. We are in a golden age for accessible electronics, programming, and computing in general. As a bonus, filesystem are generally reliable; you no longer have to deal with fiddly and unreliable magnetic storage (tapes and floppies). It’s harder to lose work than ever before.

userbinator 4y ago
a Raspberry Pi 4 is more open and infinitely better documented Are you serious?! This is what they call schematics: https://wiki.geekworm.com/File:Raspberry_Pi_4_Model_B_schematic_diagrams.pdf https://wiki.geekworm.com/File:Raspberry_Pi_4_Model_B_schema... And what passes for a datasheet is, because Broadcom, horribly incomplete (I'm still surprised no one has leaked the full datasheet yet; but thanks to the latter, even MTK-based Android smartphones are more "open and infinitely better documented"...) There was actually lots of great printed documentation for the Apple II, but you had to actually find it. And it was not easy to find it, and it was expensive to buy it, and you couldn’t buy much of it if you were of limited means. But you didn't have to sign an NDA for it, nor be big and important enough to even get a chance of being offered an NDA. For a "more open and infinitely better documented" general-purpose computer, IMHO nothing beats the IBM PC up to the AT, and even after that, PC-compatibles up to perhaps the mid 2000s. Full schematics --- even for the floppy drive, PSU, and monitor(!), CPU datasheets, BIOS source code, etc. Then came RBIL, and the rest is history.
- neilv 4y ago
  I wonder whether the Raspberry Pi organization now has enough clout to push for more-open hardware at doable price points. Or maybe some other vendor comes in (possibly with something RISC-V-based, and at least using only open source drivers, if not an open hardware GPU). They could do upstream Debian or a fork of Raspian on it, and to most users operate the same as a RasPi, only more open. (Maybe compatibility problems would be mostly due to people using closed software on a RasPi, perhaps without realizing it.)
wiz21c 4y ago
You obviously didn't read the Apple 2 Reference Manual and neither Jim Sather's book. The Apple 2 is much simpler, sure, but these documents were really professional and comprehensive.
blueflow 4y ago
No. You don't even know which disk controller you use right now. I'm referring to the one in the disk.
lproven 4y ago
Did you know every RasPi (except the Pico) runs Microsoft's proprietary ThreadX RTOS as its "firmware", which is in full control of the system? The Arms are just little slave CPUs masked onto a spare corner of the VideoCore die.

userbinator 4y ago

a Raspberry Pi 4 is more open and infinitely better documented Are you serious?! This is what they call schematics: https://wiki.geekworm.com/File:Raspberry_Pi_4_Model_B_schematic_diagrams.pdf https://wiki.geekworm.com/File:Raspberry_Pi_4_Model_B_schema... And what passes for a datasheet is, because Broadcom, horribly incomplete (I'm still surprised no one has leaked the full datasheet yet; but thanks to the latter, even MTK-based Android smartphones are more "open and infinitely better documented"...) There was actually lots of great printed documentation for the Apple II, but you had to actually find it. And it was not easy to find it, and it was expensive to buy it, and you couldn’t buy much of it if you were of limited means. But you didn't have to sign an NDA for it, nor be big and important enough to even get a chance of being offered an NDA. For a "more open and infinitely better documented" general-purpose computer, IMHO nothing beats the IBM PC up to the AT, and even after that, PC-compatibles up to perhaps the mid 2000s. Full schematics --- even for the floppy drive, PSU, and monitor(!), CPU datasheets, BIOS source code, etc. Then came RBIL, and the rest is history.

neilv 4y ago
I wonder whether the Raspberry Pi organization now has enough clout to push for more-open hardware at doable price points. Or maybe some other vendor comes in (possibly with something RISC-V-based, and at least using only open source drivers, if not an open hardware GPU). They could do upstream Debian or a fork of Raspian on it, and to most users operate the same as a RasPi, only more open. (Maybe compatibility problems would be mostly due to people using closed software on a RasPi, perhaps without realizing it.)

wiz21c 4y ago

You obviously didn't read the Apple 2 Reference Manual and neither Jim Sather's book. The Apple 2 is much simpler, sure, but these documents were really professional and comprehensive.

blueflow 4y ago

No. You don't even know which disk controller you use right now. I'm referring to the one in the disk.

lproven 4y ago

Did you know every RasPi (except the Pico) runs Microsoft's proprietary ThreadX RTOS as its "firmware", which is in full control of the system? The Arms are just little slave CPUs masked onto a spare corner of the VideoCore die.