August 2021 – Page 2 – Kev's Development Toolbox

August 11, 2021

Atoll locations in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 (part 1)

I’ve been doing some sightseeing in Microsoft Flight Simulator, flying over some of the major atoll locations around the world, and other famous Pacific island locations (e.g. Wake Island, featured in many Battlefield and other games)

The Maldives has many atolls spread across a whole archipelago of islands

VRMO Kooddoo – North eastern rim of the Huvadhu Atoll, Maldives

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kooddoo

This airport doesn’t appear to be in MSFS.

Kadhdhoo, Maldives

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kadhdhoo

Thimarafushi – Thaa Atoll, Maldives

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thimarafushi_(Thaa_Atoll)

https://skyvector.com/airport/VRNT/Thimarafushi-Airport

This is an odd one – in MSFS the island with the airport is just rendered as a large blocky beach:

Chuuk Lagoon, Micronesia – Chuuk International Airport PTKK

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuuk_International_Airport

This is a view from approx 8000ft, the southeast rim of the atoll and looking back towards larger islands in the center:

I’ll follow up with another similar post soon.

August 11, 2021August 21, 2021

Telnet BBSes and other things – part 2

A while back I posted about a number of BBSes that are accessible online, and can therefore be easily ‘dialed’ with ATD using a WiFi Modem over the internet. I recently came across this huge list of online resources accessible via telnet and took a look through some of them: https://www.jumpjet.info/Offbeat-Internet/Public/TelNet/url.htm

It seems like most of these are no longer accessible. The library online catalogs all seem to no longer be available. It’s not surprising given the insecure nature of telnet, and accessing library catalogues via your browser would be a much more secure and user friendly experience.

There’s a few things in this list that are interesting however. Ignoring the massive list of BBSes, there’s a few other oddities that are worth checking out and as of posting this, are still up and available. Here’s a few that I tested out using an Atari ST running the Taz terminal software, connected to my VT132 modem/terminal.

lynx.scramworks.net

Need access to the web but your older computer doesn’t have a browser and/or is limited to text? This site is running a telnet accessible copy of Lynx, the text mode browser. Works just as you’d expect if you were running it locally.

nethack.alt.org

Online version of the all time classic dungeon crawler, nethack

Zork and many other text based adventures: zork.retroadventures.net 6502

I’ve played around with frotz before, looking at getting some text adventures running over Amateur Radio using Packet. If you fancy accessing some classic text adventures online, this site has plenty, and there’s background info on how this was setup here:

Viewdata, glasstty.com and Telstar

Here’s an interesting one. If you were into computers in the UK in the 1980s you probably heard of BT’s Prestel service, and even if you’re not familiar with it, you’ll recognize the graphical style if you ever used Ceefax or Oracle on your TV. glasstty.com have a service called Telstar, which is a recreation of a Viewdata/Videotext system. It can be accessed online with a Viewdata terminal client app (details in the link above), or even online via a browser here.

Unfortunately the only Viewdata terminal app for the Atari ST seems to be FaSTcom, but that app crashes on my ST when it loads (I have TOS 1.04, not sure if that’s an issue or not).

Connecting with a regular VT terminal app loses all the color formatting of the pages, but you can still connect with ATDglasstty.com:6502 :

August 9, 2021August 10, 2021

Reconfiguring CosmosEx for the Atari ST

My CosmosEx (a floppy and hard disk replacement for the Atari ST) has recently started to hang on booting up with 3 yellow lights, and never completes it’s boot. It’s random though, if I power if off and try again, it seems it boots successfully about 1 in 5 tries.

I guessed it might be the original SD card that was starting to fail, so downloaded the latest image, flashed a new SD card. Rebooting now, it’s booting reliably every time.

Since this is a new startup from a fresh install, the initial disk device settings after first boot, are back to defaults. Accessing the CosmosEx via the web interface (the IP is displayed on the boot output if you connect an HDMI monitor), here’s the default settings:

I reconfigured the devices per the quick start guide here:

Henderson Field, Midway Island – PMDY

Bora Bora Airport – NTTB

Wake Island – PWAK

Great Chagos Bank