Re: Graphical WWW Browser for 8 bit Apple II computers

[sheldon@atlcom.net (Sheldon Simms)]

In article <57b23u$aer@news.wco.com>, "Charles T. Turley"
<cturley@wco.com> wrote:

> Hi Cody,
> This thread is silly only if YOU want it to be silly!  Have you ever 
> heard of the Second Sight Video card for the Apple II - which allows 
> SVGA color display for gif, jpeg and various other graphic formats?
> So, I'd say yes...do bother with 8-bit software.  What I've seen on an 
> Apple IIe - with the SS card far exceeds what I've seen with SHR on a 
> stock IIGS.

Well I believe Cody, or someone else, *did* mention the Second Sight card.
But they also pointed out that the number of 8-bit Apple II's equipped
with the SS card are very small. I wouldn't be surprised if there
were less than ten in the world. I would be shocked if there were more
than 25. That's not much of a userbase to develop for.

Even if you require a SS card in order to display the graphics, you then
have the 1Mhz 8-bit processor problem. Downloading WWW pages would take
quite a while if all the gifs are being decompressed by a 1Mhz 6502 CPU.

Also there is the problem of memory. It's not that unusual for WWW pages
to include gifs that are over 100kb in size. This is a real problem for
64k or 128k Apple II's. You have three options: require a memory card to
provide enough space to do the work, require a hard drive and use alot of
disk files as temporary storage, or preferably, require both. Graphical
WWW browsers ususally write often visited pages to a cache on disk so
they don't have to be downloaded every time. That's another reason to
require a hard drive.

So then, the hypothetical graphical browser for 8-bit Apple II's would
require an accelerated IIe, with an expanded memory card, hard drive, and
second sight card. I'll bet that the number of systems in the world
meeting those criteria can be counted on one hand, maybe even one finger.

Yes it is possible, no it's not worth doing unless the one person in the
world who actually has such a system decides to do it on a lark.

-Sheldon

-- 
W. Sheldon Simms III - sheldon@atlcom.net