Re: Apple Card Catalog

[BLuRry <brendan.robert@gmail.com>]

On Feb 10, 4:20 pm, dog_...@macgui.com (D Finnigan) wrote:
> Just the other day I thought that it might be useful to construct a
> comprehensive Apple Card Catalog. That is, a database of all known Apple II
> and IIgs expansion cards which filled a slot on the backplane.
>
> I know that there are various collections out there, such as the What is the
> GS site which is GS-only, but there doesn't seem to be anything
> comprehensive.
>
> Therefore, I propose a database-driven catalog which could contain the
> following information on each known card:
>
> - Card Name
> - Manufacturer
> - Year Released
> - Revisions
> - Expansion (for example, the RamWorks daughter cards)
> - Compatible with (e.g. GS only, //e only, etc)
> - Typical Slot (all, slot 6, Aux only, etc)
> - Category (e.g. disk controller, printer, communications, etc)
> - I/O Locations
> - ROM disassembly
> - Description
> - Programmer's Info / Usage
>
> We could also have various photos of each card, and we could even provide
> subjective information on "obtainability." As an example, the Disk ][
> controller could be classified as "Common," the AppleMouse card as
> "Uncommon," and some cards might get the distinguished label of "Rare."
> Also, we could have a button which one can click to increment a "People who
> own this card" statistic. We'd be relying on word of honor, of course, but
> it would be a neat statistic none the less!
>
> Also, fields such as year released and manufacturer would be linked, so we
> could see all cards released in 1981, for example, or all cards released by
> a certain company. Another interesting feature would be the ability to give
> the program a list of cards, and then the program uses the above slot
> information to determine a suitable card layout, complete with alternate
> layouts in case of conflict.
>
> I would be interested if anyone has suggestions on more relevant fields to
> add. I'd like to stick to just the facts, so objective things such as
> "market/collector value" would not be appropriate here, I don't think.
> Having a commonness/rarity index is just toeing the line, IMO.
>
> Any other thoughts on this? I have the skills required to write the code for
> such an online database; it'd just be the time of actually filling it out
> which would be the critical factor. It's something I have planned for later,
> but it's always good to get ideas out, I think.

The ROM dumps and I/O locations could be extremely valuable for
emulation authors for sure!   I also recommend a parts list to
indicate what chips are onboard (e.g. Mockingboard has a 6522 VIA and
a couple of AY sound chips, and a SSI-263A; Super Serial has a SY6551
ACIA chip, and so on)