Internet on the IIgs (Was: Re: Complete Basic?)

[Michael Kent <michael@syndicomm.remove.this.com>]

limtc <thyechean@gmail.com> wrote:

> Cool! As an Apple IIGS user (without the real hardware), I really
> think what you are doing is great!

It's fun (usually), which is why I do it instead of getting a more modern
computer.  I use Windows at work, and it's not fun.

> But how do you - connect to the network (especially WIFI), connect to
> Internet (without a proper browser)?

WIFI is currently beyond the Apple II, but we've seen the addition of some
neat internet applications come to the II (especially the IIgs) since you
left the scene.

Most important is Marinetti, a TCP/IP stack for the IIgs.  With it you
can connect the GS to servers, routers, and other modern internet connect-
ions without resorting to a dial-up shell.  (Having said that, I still
use a dial-up shell with Spectrum 2.0.)  Marinetti is currently open-
source and is still semi-actively supported.  Andrew Roughan from Aus-
tralia is doing most of the work and even posts here from time to time.

Spectrum has been upgraded to version 2.5.2 to support Marinetti and
kill a few bugs.  It comes with a telnet application, as does Marinetti
itself.  Ewen Wannop still supports Spectrum from his own website.

There are also script sets that use Spectrum's built-in scripting language
to support more advanced applications.  Spectrum Internet Suite (SIS) is a
non-graphical web browser.  It supports fonts, colors, and styles but not
the inline graphics that a modern browser does.  Spectrum Automated Mail
(SAM) supports POP3/SMTP mail, and Spectrum Automated File Exchange (SAFE)
supports ftp file transfers.

Other standalone programs such as SAFE 2 (a standalone version of SAFE
that does not require Spectrum to run); Speccie's News Acquisition Program
(SNAP), a Usenet newsreader; gsAIM (AOL Instant Messenger), an instant
messaging client; Samurai, an IRC client; Casper, a webserver; and
TelnetNDA, an NDA that provides telnet from within any desktop application
are all available to provide quite a few internet services to the Apple IIgs.

All of the above is software functionality you can have on the Apple IIgs
once you get it physically connected to the internet.  There are several
ways to do that.

1) You can use a non-TCP/IP version of Spectrum to call a dial-up shell
and use client-side internet applications such as lynx or links for web
browsing, tin for newsreading, pine for emailing, irc for chatting, etc.
This is what I do, but it's admittedly obsolete even by Apple II standards.
If you go this route, the software above is not available to you.

2) You can install Marinetti and use Spectrum 2.5.2 to call a dial-up shell
using TCP/IP for data transfer.  This will enable you to use all of the
above-mentioned internet applications on your IIgs.  This will be my next
step once I get off my butt and do it.

3) You can install Marinetti and use the MacIP link layer module to
connect to a pre-iMac Macintosh through the IIgs's built-in AppleTalk.
This will also allow you to use the above-mentioned internet applications.

4) You can connect your IIgs into a home ethernet network with a LANce
GS or an Uthernet card.  These are ethernet cards for the IIgs and are
supported by Marinetti.  You will probably have to connect the GS through
a server/router/firewall, but there are articles on how to do this in 
Juiced.GS and (I think) on the csa2 archives.  This will be what I event-
ually do once I get #2 up and running.

Others here have gone down this path and are available to help (I hope!).

The IIgs would hardly pass for a modern computer these days, but it's come
a long ways in the last 15 years.  And that's what makes it so much fun.

Mike