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Original IBM PC (Intel 8088) in Javascript with Visicalc
67 points by benwen on Nov 14, 2012 | hide | past | favorite | 13 comments



For some reason I get a control-L (^L) after every character I type which makes this usable for me but it sure brings back some nostalgia!

Ah okay the keyboard was only broken in firefox but it works in chrome.

My instinct immediately made me type prompt $p$g from something buried keep in my memory!

Basic works and you can make a program within a program within a browser. Ha.


Something similar happened to me when I ran an Apple II emulator for the first time. Even though it had been years since I last used a real Apple //c, seeing the prompt in the correct font with the cursor blink at the exact right tempo rewired my brain on the fly and I was typing commands and writing BASIC programs almost immediately.

I still fire it up occasionally to play through my old games and look at my old programs. Nostalgia is a powerful thing.


I also managed to remember some of the Edlin's commands.


I could use the basic functions of Edlin back then, when I was 7 or 8, but I have absolutely no idea how to do anything with it anymore. I'd have to look it up.

Totally recognized the grandparent post's prompt $p$g though.


No need to use edlin. Just copy con: file.txt and make a .bat file!


Wow, this is awesome! How can I upload original disk images? Can we get an 8086 emulator with VGA? I would love to have all of my old games & software available in the browser. (Scorched Earth, Infocom, Sierra, etc.)


+1 for Scorched Earth, the mother of all games :-)


PC-DOS disk 2 has debug.com too. With the "A" command you can program fun things in assembler and save to com files :)

(color video memory at B800:0000)


Run Visicalc by loading it using the menu and "Load Drive", then enter "vc" + return.


This is awesome, I've yet to figure out a practical use for it. I might try running something like CP/M-86 on it though!


Fantastic. I know I can view the source but is packaged up somewhere with a readme?


Neat.

First thing I did was run BASIC and start poking and peeking. Ah, the good old days.


  basica b:donkey.bas
Wonderful.




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