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Show HN: MacProxy Plus – Surf the Modern Web on Vintage Computers

84 points by hunterirving 2y ago

I created an enhanced fork of the popular MacProxy project called MacProxy Plus, which makes it possible to browse the modern web on vintage hardware. You run MPP on a machine on your local network and configure the Mac (or other vintage computer) to use it as a proxy server. MPP converts HTTPS to HTTP, strips out CSS, JavaScript, and other tags the Mac's browser doesn't recognize, then serves super-simplified HTML that actually loads pretty fast on the nearly 40 year old machine. Custom handling is enabled by "extensions" (individual python scripts) which intercept requests for given domains (like chatgpt.com) and return simple HTML interfaces. Current extensions include Weather, ChatGPT, Anthropic Claude, Wikipedia, Reddit, Hackaday, WayBack Machine, Web Simulator, and (not) YouTube. Though this solution was developed with early Macs in mind, it should also work to get many other vintage computers online.

bsimpson 2y ago
> Type a URL that doesn't exist into the address bar, and Anthropic's Claude 3.5 Sonnet will interpret the domain and any query parameters to generate an imagined version of that page on the fly. Each HTTP request is serialized and sent to the AI, along with the full HTML of the last 3 pages you visited, allowing you to explore a vast, interconnected, alternate reality Internet where the only limit is your imagination. I want to try this.
- hunterirving 2y ago
  That feature was inspired by an existing website, https://websim.ai/ https://websim.ai/ . Definitely worth checking out, and a lot more feature rich than the vintage Macintosh version.
  - bsimpson 2y ago
    thanks! i really don't like that it wants me to login with my google credentials just to play with it.
- selimthegrim 2y ago
  Zombo.com is crying tears of Flash.
news_to_me 2y ago
Oh this looks perfect! I kind of intended to make something like this, but now I don't have to. Looking forward to replacing my macproxy with this to try it out :)
- hunterirving 2y ago
  Thanks for checking it out! Hope it works out well for you.
ralphc 2y ago
How do you configure System 6 or 7 to use a proxy?
- nemo 2y ago
  It's been a while, but from what I recall with early Macs apps like mail clients and browsers would have their own proxy settings rather than any system-wide setting, so you'd set the proxy in Netscape (or whatever).
- hunterirving 2y ago
  The browser I'm using (MacWeb 2.0) has its own proxy config (you can see it in the demonstration video around 3:27), but you can also enable a proxy at the system level using Internet Config (click Firewalls, check "Use HTTP Proxy", then enter the server address and port in the text field).
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- johnklos 2y ago
  There are ways to do this transparently if you control the machine doing NAT for the classic computer. Doing things that way used to be more common before https became the default for most sites, because nowadays you'd have to install TLS certificates on each client to not constantly get errors. However, if you're also proxying https to http, then no worries! I should update my transparent proxy how-to to be used with MacProxy Plus...
- numpad0 2y ago
  Most Classic Macs didn't have an RJ45 jack(for Ethernet) in the first place. Proxy config menus were a lot more common and accessible back then as well.
zoeysmithe 2y ago
Oh wow I saw this on reddit the other day. Now to find an affordable vintage mac.
- hunterirving 2y ago
  If you're patient (and willing to do some repair work) you can sometimes find reasonably priced fixer-uppers on eBay.
- numpad0 2y ago
  Random old Macs are still like $80 on eBay if you don't need a specific model, they aren't all that expensive yet.
VyseofArcadia 2y ago
> MPP converts HTTPS to HTTP, strips out CSS, JavaScript, and other tags the Mac's browser doesn't recognize, then serves super-simplified HTML that actually loads pretty fast on the nearly 40 year old machine. Honestly this sounds like a pretty great way to experience the modern web on modern computers too.
- hunterirving 2y ago
  If your browser lets you configure a proxy server, it should work!
helfire 2y ago
Was great to see the video[0] you did (and production quality, humor, etc) showcasing MacProxy Plus. As the BlueSCSI maintainer it's always exciting to see it being used the wild in cool new things like this! [0] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1v1gWLHcOk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1v1gWLHcOk
- hunterirving 2y ago
  Thanks again for your contributions! The BlueSCSI is a fantastic little device. I've really enjoyed playing with it.
newman314 2y ago
I wonder if this will work with a Newton?
- hunterirving 2y ago
  I was able to dig up this ancient webpage about a browser for the Newton called PocketWeb ( http://web.archive.org/web/20120610041940/https://www.teco.edu/pocketweb http://web.archive.org/web/20120610041940/https://www.teco.e... ). Sounds promising.
hoistbypetard 2y ago
Really nice work. I like the idea of site-specific extensions, and think that's the only way to do this and keep your sanity. This seems like it'd pair really well with FrogFind.
- hunterirving 2y ago
  Thanks for checking it out! I'm a big fan of FrogFind. http://68k.news http://68k.news was another one that got the gears turning while starting out on this project.
Einenlum 2y ago
This amount of work and creativity is insane here. Well done!
- hunterirving 2y ago
  Thanks for checking it out! I had some help from the many open source projects I made use of :-)
gattilorenz 2y ago
Another option for the same purpose is the Web Rendering Proxy by Tenox, which can also supports images/js by prerendering the page and serving and image map to the old browser: https://github.com/tenox7/wrp https://github.com/tenox7/wrp

84 points by hunterirving 2y ago

bsimpson 2y ago

> Type a URL that doesn't exist into the address bar, and Anthropic's Claude 3.5 Sonnet will interpret the domain and any query parameters to generate an imagined version of that page on the fly. Each HTTP request is serialized and sent to the AI, along with the full HTML of the last 3 pages you visited, allowing you to explore a vast, interconnected, alternate reality Internet where the only limit is your imagination. I want to try this.

hunterirving 2y ago
That feature was inspired by an existing website, https://websim.ai/ https://websim.ai/ . Definitely worth checking out, and a lot more feature rich than the vintage Macintosh version.
- bsimpson 2y ago
  thanks! i really don't like that it wants me to login with my google credentials just to play with it.
selimthegrim 2y ago
Zombo.com is crying tears of Flash.

news_to_me 2y ago

Oh this looks perfect! I kind of intended to make something like this, but now I don't have to. Looking forward to replacing my macproxy with this to try it out :)

hunterirving 2y ago
Thanks for checking it out! Hope it works out well for you.

ralphc 2y ago

How do you configure System 6 or 7 to use a proxy?

nemo 2y ago
It's been a while, but from what I recall with early Macs apps like mail clients and browsers would have their own proxy settings rather than any system-wide setting, so you'd set the proxy in Netscape (or whatever).
hunterirving 2y ago
The browser I'm using (MacWeb 2.0) has its own proxy config (you can see it in the demonstration video around 3:27), but you can also enable a proxy at the system level using Internet Config (click Firewalls, check "Use HTTP Proxy", then enter the server address and port in the text field).
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
johnklos 2y ago
There are ways to do this transparently if you control the machine doing NAT for the classic computer. Doing things that way used to be more common before https became the default for most sites, because nowadays you'd have to install TLS certificates on each client to not constantly get errors. However, if you're also proxying https to http, then no worries! I should update my transparent proxy how-to to be used with MacProxy Plus...
numpad0 2y ago
Most Classic Macs didn't have an RJ45 jack(for Ethernet) in the first place. Proxy config menus were a lot more common and accessible back then as well.

zoeysmithe 2y ago

Oh wow I saw this on reddit the other day. Now to find an affordable vintage mac.

hunterirving 2y ago
If you're patient (and willing to do some repair work) you can sometimes find reasonably priced fixer-uppers on eBay.
numpad0 2y ago
Random old Macs are still like $80 on eBay if you don't need a specific model, they aren't all that expensive yet.

VyseofArcadia 2y ago

> MPP converts HTTPS to HTTP, strips out CSS, JavaScript, and other tags the Mac's browser doesn't recognize, then serves super-simplified HTML that actually loads pretty fast on the nearly 40 year old machine. Honestly this sounds like a pretty great way to experience the modern web on modern computers too.

hunterirving 2y ago
If your browser lets you configure a proxy server, it should work!

helfire 2y ago

Was great to see the video[0] you did (and production quality, humor, etc) showcasing MacProxy Plus. As the BlueSCSI maintainer it's always exciting to see it being used the wild in cool new things like this! [0] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1v1gWLHcOk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1v1gWLHcOk

hunterirving 2y ago
Thanks again for your contributions! The BlueSCSI is a fantastic little device. I've really enjoyed playing with it.

newman314 2y ago

I wonder if this will work with a Newton?

hunterirving 2y ago
I was able to dig up this ancient webpage about a browser for the Newton called PocketWeb ( http://web.archive.org/web/20120610041940/https://www.teco.edu/pocketweb http://web.archive.org/web/20120610041940/https://www.teco.e... ). Sounds promising.

hoistbypetard 2y ago

Really nice work. I like the idea of site-specific extensions, and think that's the only way to do this and keep your sanity. This seems like it'd pair really well with FrogFind.

hunterirving 2y ago
Thanks for checking it out! I'm a big fan of FrogFind. http://68k.news http://68k.news was another one that got the gears turning while starting out on this project.

Einenlum 2y ago

This amount of work and creativity is insane here. Well done!

hunterirving 2y ago
Thanks for checking it out! I had some help from the many open source projects I made use of :-)

gattilorenz 2y ago

Another option for the same purpose is the Web Rendering Proxy by Tenox, which can also supports images/js by prerendering the page and serving and image map to the old browser: https://github.com/tenox7/wrp https://github.com/tenox7/wrp