SINIX-Z 5.42 on 86Box

(this is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka Tenox)

As part of nerdy new year celebrations I got Fujitsu Siemens Nixdorf Informationssysteme SINIX-Z running on 86Box. This was possible thanks to Plamen and Vlad!.

SINIX-Z 5.42 on 86Box

Update: got X11 going:

Mosaic browser on Sinix 5.42 on 86Box

Also C compiler:

Also networking… apparently you have to manually connect it.

Here is a pre-installed image and 86Box configuration file. Now includes bash, gcc and gzip. These are also downloadable here.

SoftWindows on OpenVMS

(This is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka Tenox)

I like exploring vintage hypervisors and emulators. In the past I did a whole series on Merge, VP/IX and others. This time I wanted to take look at something a little more exotic – SoftWindows on Alpha OpenVMS. I have in fact installed it a while back but I could never get it properly licensed. I looked everywhere, asked everyone and of course no one had a license pack for this. Fortunately there are two license generators for OpenVMS, pakgen and lmfgen. But how do you find out what is the exact product code and vendor? VMS provides a license debug facility:

$ reply/enable=license
$ define/sys/exec lmf$display_opcom_message true

Then, when starting an app, you will get an opcom log message with all the required product name, vendor, etc. The rest is easy. For the lazy, here is a complete license pack for SoftWindows:

$ LICENSE REGISTER SOFTPC -
        /ISSUER=DEC -
        /PRODUCER=DEC -
        /UNITS=0 -
        /OPTIONS=(MOD_UNITS,ALPHA) -
        /CHECKSUM=2-GNHM-DAFO-CPGG-AICI
$ LICENSE LOAD SOFTPC

Here is a screenshot for your viewing pleasure!

SoftWindows on OpenVMS Alpha

The install comes with it’s own version of Windows 3.1 plus some additional tools and apps, typical for Insignia products. You can map drives to folders, ports COM and LPT, etc. There are a variety of video modes – Hercules, CGA, EGA and VGA, even 256 colors. The performance is quite decent, however the CPU is pegged at 100%, as you can see in the system monitor. There is a CPU idle detection tool, however it doesn’t seem to work very well. I suspect that perhaps this may be to do with much never OpenVMS version, than the software has been designed for. The SoftWindows has been released in 1994 and not been updated since.

How do you install and run this thing? There is a full installation guide, however since this is just a PCSI file, you can simply use product install:

$ unzip softwin-v0100.zip
$ product install *

To start it you cast these magic spells:

$ @sys$sysroot:[sysmgr]softwin$startup.com
$ softwin

Since SoftWindows is essentially SoftPC you can run pure DOS mode. I will do a follow up on this and explore some DOS games.

You can find all the files on osarchive.org.

From a hindsight, it’s ironic how roles have reversed in 30 years. Back then MS-DOS / Windows was a toy OS, running on a toy “personal” computer, emulated in a little window on a “real” computer like DEC Alpha. In modern times you run OpenVMS as a guest VM on a Windows PC.

Have fun with virtualization!

Windows NT 3.1 on DEC Alpha AXP

(this is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka Tenox)

As I was preparing the Windows NT RISC exhibit for VCF west, I realized that I’m missing a rather important piece of the history. While I will be showing the potentially last DEC Alpha Windows build ever – AXP64 2210, I don’t have anything earlier than NT 3.51. It would be nice to showcase the very first RTM version – NT 3.1. From time perspective, NT did not get popular until the version 3.5 and later. Windows NT 3.1 would be considered rare even on a 386, let alone on a RISC CPU! So what RISC hardware does Windows NT 3.1 run on?

NT 3.1 RISC HCL

Not many! The HCL published on gunkies has a few more systems, but nothing that I have. The early MIPS based systems are all but unobtanium as of today. This is probably a good time to mention a little known port of Windows NT 3.1 to the DECstation 5000. However these builds are not found even on earliest NT betas. Not to mention lack of ARC firmware for this machine.

The Alphas were looking a little more reachable. The DEC 2000 Model 300 and DECpc AXP 150 are one and the same machine, packaged in a server and workstation cases. Code-named Jensen, DEC designed and marketed these specifically around Windows NT. Unlike prior Alphas, this model used a lot of “PC” components for increased compatibility and lower cost. Eventually paved way for the more well known DEC Multia. The Jensen has been seen floating here and there and many people have these.

I was able to get a loaner from Chris Satterfield aka Compgeke for the VCF. Having a working specimen at hand, I started looking at part numbers of various components. In an amazing streak of luck, in practically zero time I was able to find, buy and assemble a complete DECpc AXP 150 from spare parts on eBay! Without a case, but nevertheless. Also big thanks to Christopher Rivett for help with some fine details!

Franken Jensen built from spare parts off eBay.
Jensen running at VCF West 2023, with fans installed

BOM

  • Motherboard + CPU – DEC 70-29685-01
  • GPU – DEC/Compaq Qvision 1024/E (1024×768) – 126654-001
  • GPU – (Optional) Number 9 High Res (1280×1024) – 30-41800-01
  • HBA – Adaptec AHA-1742A EISA – 467806-00
  • NIC – DEC DE422-S EISA – 5021102-01
  • RAM – 4x 16MB, FPM, 60ns, 72-Pin, 12-Chip, True Parity SIMM
  • PSU – DEC/HP 30-37197-02, however a standard AT PSU may be OK

If you going to build one yourself, beware of overheating. Jensen runs rather hot and needs good cooling. Not only for the CPU. There is a section of the motherboard just under the EISA cards that runs incredibly hot. See the picture, where I have installed a large Noctua fan.

OS Install

There are many Windows NT 3.1 CDROMs floating around. I purchased a DEC branded, shrink-wrapped CD on eBay to use as a prop along with the machine. You can download the iso image here.

Installation of Windows NT 3.1 on DECpc AXP 150 is pretty straightforward and not that much different from the later versions. However as a prerequisite you will need the ECU floppy disk to configure the EISA slot assignments, card and jumper settings. After that you will have to go through various setup screens in ARC BIOS to configure system settings. Then you run arcinst to create a system partition and setupldr to install the OS. The rest of it is pretty uneventful. This is somewhat expected, as this was pretty much the only one and supported hardware combination, so must have been well tested. The only curious part is that the NT OS Kernel does not display any text during normal boot. Later versions of NT will display the build number and MP or UP kernel variant and dots indicating subsystem load progress. This is rather odd because I expected more text mode stuff from older NT version, but who knows.

Jensen NT 3.1 Boot Menu
Windows NT 3.1 on DEC Alpha AXP, DECpc 150 aka Jensen

Service Pack Saga

If you are even vaguely familiar with installing Windows NT at all, you will know that the very first thing you have to perform after installation, is to apply a service pack. NT 3.1 did have service packs, up to SP3. The problem is that, as you may very well expect, non-x86 editions were nowhere to be found in 2023. The only thing I could come up with was http://www.win31.de/ent31.htm, which had a German AXP and MIPS SP3, but no English! [It since has been updated…]. I had to do some real detective work to track down an US-English AXP SP3 version. I spent a few days going through various random CDs and ftp site mirrors of that era, with little luck. Eventually I stumbled on this README file, stating:

Due to space constraints on the Windows NT Service Packs for
International Versions CD, the USA Service Pack version 3 is located on
the Additional Windows NT Service Packs, Windows 3.11 versions, SDKs,
and DDKs CD in the NTSRVPC3\USA directory.

Bingo! After a few hits and missed I spotted this particular CDROM here: https://archive.org/details/microsoft-developer-network-january-1995-disc-4-of-15 – Now the OS is finally “servicepacked” 🙂

Applications!

My general impression of NT 3.1 on DEC Alpha is pretty awesome. If you can overlook the age and some obvious shortcomings, the OS is pretty stable, solid and even snappy for such old hardware. An OS itself without apps is not much. While overall Alpha NT application outlook is pretty scanty I was able to find a several very interesting gems!

Most importantly, thanks to Chris, a DEC Windows NT Developers CD-ROM!

The disk has an incredible amount of demo, freeware, public domain and shareware applications as well as DEC marketing material.

Windows NT Developers CD for DEC Alpha NT 3.1

You can get a lot of DEC proprietary software like C++, Fortran, PATHWORKS, DECtalk, as well as X servers, etc.

However I was particularly interested in some 3rd party commercial apps.

For example there is an early version of DMC Calamus Desktop Publishing.

DMC Calamus desktop publishing on Windows NT 3.1 DEC Alpha AXP

Also a demo version of a vintage, text-mode SlickEdit, way before it was replaced by the Visual SlickEdit known today.

SlickEdit 2.3 on Windows NT 3.1 DEC Alpha AXP

There also is WinDev editior, which is quite superior to Notepad and has some code editing goodies and shortcuts to SDK tools, making it something of a simple IDE.

WinDev 1.56 on Windows NT 3.1 DEC Alpha AXP

Another big source is Windows NT Application Sampler CDROM, (also from Smithsonian).

One of the coolest thing found there is a graphical text editor called WinEdit. It has a ton of features and even syntax highlighting! It has since became my default to go editor / IDE on this system!

WinEdit 3.0E on Windows NT 3.1 DEC Alpha AXP

There of course is a Windows NT SDK with the M (MEP) editor.

Windows NT 3.1 SDK with M / MEP Editor on DEC Alpha AXP

There also are quite few public domain apps and games, ports of GNU software, Micro Emacs, Kermit, etc.

Update: CICA NT Shareware Collection has some interesting apps under the /alpha directory.

High Resolution GPU

One of things that was troubling me for some time was rather low resolution of the default QVision graphics card. The maximum being only 1024×768 is just not acceptable. Talking to several Jensen’s owners, no one even heard about anything better. However looking at the Windows setup options, I curiously noticed that the system does support one 1280×1024 video card – Number 9 GXE.

I simply assumed that such card would simply be unobtanium in 2023. However, digging through some old catalogs and spare part listings, I managed to find a DEC part number, which is 30-41800-01. Armed with this, I was able to find it via DEC spare part reseller that I often use. They had it in stock listed as “HIGH RES EISA 1280 x 1024 GRAPHICS”. The price wasn’t too bad either, at least compared to the whole endeavor. A few days later I received this:

After installation of the S3 driver (must be the Service Pack 3 version!) I was finally able to get 1280×1024 from the poor thing!

With this I should have a more cozy environment to compile and port even more apps 🙂

In future I want to try the Advanced Server edition as well as some early Betas with Alpha support.

Windows NT on IBM RS/6000 – Definitive Guide

(This is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka Tenox)

Preparing for Windows NT RISC Exhibition for VCFW 2023, I wanted to have NT running on an IBM RS/6000. This was previously covered in this excellent article by Shoutmon as well in this excellent video by NCommander. However both are missing some crucial information that I had to go through and learn myself the hard way. I hope it will help someone in the future.

Windows NT PowerPC was designed to run on PReP machines, however that by itself is not very useful. Which of the RS/6000 models are REeP and which are not? This is coincidentally answered by NetBSD/prep supported system models.

Firstly there are IBM PC Power Series. Yes IBM PC but with PowerPC CPU, and not to be confused with RS/6000 which is a different IBM product. However the IBM Power Series have equivalent RS/6000 “counterpart” models. WTF IBM.

IBM PC Power Series 440 6015 == IBM RS/6000 Model 7020 40P
IBM PC Power Series 830 6050 == IBM RS/6000 Model 7248 43P
IBM PC Power Series 850 6070 == IBM RS/6000 Model 7248 43P

There are also other models mentioned by Windows NT 4.0 HCL, namely E20, E30 and F30, and PowerPC ThinkPads. To summarize here is a more definitive list of IBM RS/6000 models supported by Windows NT 4.0:

Model 7020 40P
Model 7248 43P, 100 and 133 MHz
Model 7248 43P-140 (with a big asterisk)
Model 7024 E20 and E30
Model 7025 F30
ThinkPad 820, 850
ThinkPad 860 (with a big asterisk
)

If you could pick any RS/6000 machine, the 40P would probably be the most recommended. 40P can also run OS/2 PowerPC if you are in to this thing.

Unfortunately all I had on hand was 43P-140, which is PReP, but it’s not Power Series based and not supported by NT out of the box. WTF IBM. Chances are that you will run in to this as well. 43P-140 are way more popular and easier to acquire than any other hardware listed above.

The main trouble with 43P-140 is that the onboard GPU and NIC will not work with ARC and NT. Yes, you can hack in some generic S3 card. It will work in ARC/NT but not PROM and AIX. I wasn’t happy. Upon some collaboration with Shoutmon and NCcommander and my own research, I was able to find the one and only graphics card that will work in both the RS/6000 PROM as well as ARC BIOS, AIX and Windows NT. The lucky winner is:

IBM FRU 40H5838 aka GTX110P

Update: It’s been tried, tested and verified to use IBM ROM with a regular/stock S3 Trio64V+. You can download it here and program yourself.

It’s entirely possible that other adapters will work as well, however from all different cards that I tried this was the only one that worked in all combination.

As for NIC, there are way more options as it’s not used by PROM, ARC or AIX, just NT. In my case I opted for a standard Etherlink III card.

Once you have the correct hardware bits, NT installation is pretty straightforward. This is well covered elsewhere. In a nutshell you boot the ARC 1.51 floppy disk, setup partitions and install the OS. Note that the ARC BIOS will be installed in to a partition on your HDD and the floppy disk is not required beyond installation.

Installation on PowerPC ThinkPads, specifically the 860 is covered here.

Monitoring temperature of ancient hardware

(This is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka Tenox)

I’m preparing a Windows NT RISC exhibition for VCF West 2023. While the CHM building is air conditioned, it’s far far from ideal and we have a rather hot summer. Most of the vintage machines lack CPU power management. Some, such as Alphas, are notorious for overheating. Despite installing modern fans and heatsinks, this still makes me uneasy. I wanted to come up with some thermal monitoring system to see whats going on in real time. Maybe alert or shut down if things go out of hand.

For a while now I been thinking about using Arduino with a thermistor. It would read the temperature sensor and send the data via serial port to the host. This should universally work for most old computers, as they commonly have serial ports. However, upon some prototyping I realized that between custom pcb/wiring, power requirements and TTL to RS232 converter, the whole thing was becoming a little too complicated for what I really wanted. Fortunately I came across a rather ingenious solution – someone sells this item on eBay:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/231213936167

It’s basically a thermal probe with RS232 interface, emitting a plain text ASCII string output. No drivers or software required. They are a little bit pricey. Perhaps readers can find a cheaper version. However it’s absolutely a perfect solution for what I really wanted. Note that the seller can make shorter cables on request. The default 3m is insanely long for this purpose.

With help of some thermal glue, installed the probe in to the CPU heat sink and routed the cable to a COM port in the back.

Above pictures are from Multia and PWS.

You can simply read the temperature as an ASCII string from the COM port:

However since this is a prestigious event I wanted something fancier. Also a simple terminal can’t really tell when was the data received and therefore is current. I banged out a simple Win32 app to have something nice on the screen:

If there is no update from serial port in last 10 seconds, “no data” will be shown. The text label changes color if the temperature goes over a threshold to warn if things are getting too hot.

I even added a thermal shutdown, if it goes over a critical value. However this only works on Windows 2000 and above. Earlier Windows NT versions lacked ACPI HAL support to invoke power down. Fortunately this will work nicely for 2210 build on PWS 500 and Windows XP on Itanium!

After VCF I’ll make something for Unix and VMS as well. Perhaps also a service / daemon version that can run in the background and doesn’t require GUI.

Source code and binaries: https://github.com/tenox7/readtemp

Windows 2000 64-bit for Alpha AXP

(this is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka tenox)

Hinted by friends on Discord, Neozeed recently “discovered” a Win64 compiler for AXP64 / ALPHA64. It came as part of Windows Platform SDK from 1999. Microsoft wanted developers to test-compile their code to see if it’s “64bit ready”, well ahead of the 64bit hardware even being available. However, this was just a cross-compiler and there was no way of running any of the binaries. That is until Itanium eventually came out, after infamously long delays. The Win64 project for AXP64 and IA64 was code name “Sundown”.

Trying the compiler, just for fun, I built Alpha64 version of Aclock – with zero hopes of ever being able to run it. There are some known surviving machines with AXP64 stored at Microsoft Archives. In fact I saw one with my own eyes, last time I visited there some 10 years ago:

DEC Alpha with AXP64 Windows at Microsoft Archives.
DEC Alpha with AXP64 Windows codename “Sundown”, at Microsoft Archives, 2014

The machine in picture above was featured in a blog post by Raymond Chen, which is a must read. It will give you background info on the whole Alpha 64bit situation. Sadly, 64-bit Alpha AXP Windows was never released outside of Redmond.

And that would be the end of the story… if not for one generous reader, who contacted Neozeed after his previous post, and shared a disk image… containing non other but a 64bit build of Windows 2000 for Alpha AXP! The reader got it from a lot of random hard disks, bought from an e-waste, years ago and completely forgot about it until they saw the blog post!

The image was previously installed on Digital Personal Workstation. Having a PWS500 with ZuluSCSI handy, I was able to slap the image on an SD card and boot it up:

Windows 2000 Alpha64 Splash Screen

The system BSOD shortly after. Turns out, this is a checked (debug) build and requires a permanently attached kernel debugger to even boot up. Initially WinDbg and kd.exe refused to work, as the target CPU did not match the host (the exact error code is: KD Version has unknown processor architecture). After some deliberation and help from friends, I learned that alphakd.exe can be run on x86 machine to cross debug an Alpha target. Most importantly it works with AXP64!

Another problem was that the system came up with “Found New Hardware” wizard and there was no functioning keyboard and mouse to click through it. Yes, I tried safe mode, VGA mode, etc., but nothing worked. The system was completely stuck on this dialog:

Fortunately, the network card worked. Neozeed and I built and hacked in to the registry an rlogin daemon. Finally solved the PNP fuckup by remotely executing a VBScript that clicked through 20+ “found new hardware” and “install unsigned driver” dialogs. Eventually, a PCI to ISA bridge was found and keyboard and mouse came up!

Aclock running on 64bit Windows on Alpha AXP

Unfortunately there are no identifying marks that would definitely prove that this is a 64bit Alpha AXP build. The only way to tell is because there is no WOW, even for AXP32. You can’t run 32bit Alpha binaries. It will only run executables produced with the ALPHA64 compiler. This also means in practice there is no self hosted, native compiler. You have to cross compile on 32bit NT4 or 2KRC.

For sake of search engines the build number is 2210, the full string: 2210.main.000302-1934.

Update I have copied and ran a x86 `winmsd.exe` from Windows NT 4.0 and this came out:

How is it possible to run x86 binary? Because of Fx!32.

Update: So what else is in the image?

First of all, everyone is asking about Pinball… Yes, it’s there, but it won’t start:

In addition, I can’t open the event details. Maybe one day we can debug it with NTSD.

Other than that, it has some basic stuff, the every other Windows would have. Internet Explorer 5.5, agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows NT 5.0). Sadly msinfo32 doesn’t work, unable to connect to a service.

The image, similar to other private builds, comes with Internal Developer Workstation (IDW). It’s a set of developer tools, that most of (but not all) were released in Platform SDK and/or Windows Resource Kit.

There are a bunch of unix like utilities, cp, mv, ls, kill, etc.:

build.exe version 4.03.2209

It can build for AXP32 and IA64:

There also are two famous text editors, Microsoft Editor aka MEP / Z and Stevie, VI clone:

Lastly, lets explore 64bit Alpha AXP gaming scene! While Pinball doesn’t work, IDW comes with an impressive amount of games. Microsoft engineers must have been busy playing these while waiting for builds to complete…

64-bit gaming on Alpha AXP

We have 4 different card games, FreeCell, Solitaire, Gold and Cruel. Also Taipei game, TicTactics, Reversi, Minesweeper and Snake.

AXP64 NT also has fully working OpenGL Screensavers:

If you want to see this live in action. We going to be exhibiting on VCF West 2023 in August, alongside other NT RISC machines. Come and see us!

OpenVMS x86 hobbyist finally here!

(This is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka Tenox)

After years of waiting, VMS Software finally released OpenVMS x86 for hobbyist use. Luckily I was able to download the install media and a hobbyist license pack from the Service Platform portal. So lets have some fun with virtualization!

OpenVMS x86 has pretty strict hardware requirements. It only works as a VM (no physical hardware support). It wants a recent CPU. The VM must have EFI BIOS and E1000 NIC. As for storage controller – both HDD and CDROM must be on the same SATA controller.

The ISO image boots to a fancy new loader screen:

OpenVMS x86 on VMware ESXi

However as cute as it looks, don’t have your hopes up for a real GUI. That’s as far as it goes:

Once the OS boots up, it switches to a serial console for the rest of installation and operation. Being a VM and having no access to physical serial port, I hooked it up via named pipe to another VM’s serial port.

Just for fun let’s use a recent build of C-Kermit by David Goodwin!

The installation is pretty straightforward. I picked all the defaults and off you go.

The system installs under couple of minutes. A boot takes just couple of seconds and it’s extremely fast end responsive. This is somewhat expected as the VMS dates back to 1977 and hasn’t grown in bloat much like more “modern” OSes.

One of first things to do after installation, is to register the license packs and configure TCP/IP.

For license pack I added the “BOE” pak by hand and transferred the rest as a `.com` file after TCP/IP was setup.

To configure IP you simply run @sys$manager:tcpip$config and go through the steps. Networking doesn’t start by default, so you need to edit sys$startup:systartup_vms.com file and uncomment line saying @sys$startup:tcpip$startup.com. After that you should be able to telnet to the VM at every boot. Also note that OpenVMS comes with some unix commands for the tcpip subsystem, you can find them in help under TCPIP_Services -> UNIX_Commands

You can setup auto boot in the graphical console by typing “auto boot”, this way you never have to open the graphical console to type boot.

Browsing through software packages on the VMS service portal you can find a C compiler, Fortran, as well as some typical OSS packages like OpenSSH, SSL, Samba, Git and many more.

Apparently there also is a WebUI for VMS?

I’m hoping that in future OpenVMS will be available on some public clouds like AWS, Azure and GCP. This would open some interesting possibilities.

I’m going to go and port some apps to x86 VMS!

SimCity for Unix Liberated

(This is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka Tenox)

In early 90s DUX Software ported SimCity classic UNIX. They provided downloadable demo versions for SunOS, Solaris, HP-UX, SGI IRIX, OSF/1, Digital Unix, OpenDesktop, UnixWare, Linux and BSD.

SimCity SGI IRIX screenshot from DUX website

In the winter break wave of nostalgia I wanted to play SimCity on my vintage HPUX workstation. Unfortunately the 5 minute demo just wouldn’t cut it. Back in 1993 you could simply purchase a license key and unlock the demo to a full version. However even if I could find an old license code, these keys were “Host ID” locked, so you could not easily use it on a different machine anyway.

In 2008 SimCity Classic has been open sourced under a new name Micropolis for the OLPC project. This was truly epic endeavor, many thanks to everyone involved. Unfortunately for vintage computer enthusiasts, the source code been updated to compile on a modern Linux, before it was released to the public. It will no longer build on any old Unix system. Typically, when a developer decides to free up their obsolete version, they just toss out some licenses codes. Sadly this time no one ever bothered.

The only option left was to bypass the license checking code. Fortunately, modern binary analysis tools make patching old apps relatively straightforward. In just minutes I was able to get the game started in a full multiplayer mode. A few hours later I got it patched on all the vintage Unix platforms!

SimCity on Solaris 7 (also works on 8 and 9)
SimCity on HP-UX 9 (doesn’t work on 10 or 11 due to TCL/TK issues)
SimCity on OSF/1 aka Digital Unix aka Tru64
SimCity on IRIX 5.3 on MAME (doesn’t work on never IRIX due to COFF binary)
SimCity on SunOS 4.1.4 on QEMU
SimCity on SCO OpenServer / OpenDesktop (ODT)

UPDATE: patched IRIX as well! Special thanks to Mr^Burns for providing a preinstalled IRIX 5.3 MAME image!

UPDATE: patched SunOS version as well. Special thanks to Daghdha for preinstalled SunOS 4.1.4 QEMU image!

UPDATE: patched SCO Unix/ODT version as well.

You can download the demo versions and patches here. Happy gaming on your vintage Unix Workstation!

If you just want to try the game without bothering with an ancient unix, you can simply sudo apt install micropolis && micropolis on a modern Linux – it’s identical except for multiplayer

Web Rendering Proxy v4.6 released

(this is a guest post by Antoni Sawicki aka Tenox)

Pleased to announce WRP version 4.6! After almost two years of no updates due to dependency issues I finally resolved everything. More frequent work should resume now.

The main improvement visible to users is the new GIF encoding. I have been struggling with poor GIF performance for quite a while. This was mostly manifested on lower end machines running WRP such as Raspberry PI or these micro instances in the cloud.

Thanks to invaluable work of Hill Ma we now have blazing fast GIFs. Probably order of 100x improvements! This comes at a cost of quality, especially of color palette and dithering. However worse quality of imagery has a surprise improvement of font/text quality which is what a lot of people wanted.

WRP 4.6 with default 216 color GIF

Note that by default WRP uses GIF with 216 “web safe” colors. We choose this not so much for number of colors but rather activation of the super fast GIF encoding.

WRP 4.6 in 256 color mode GIF

When switching to 256 color mode the image look much better, however it takes around 25x longer to encode (7ms vs 170ms).

When using PNG this is of course not a problem.

0 height mode, which renders tall images of full page length has also been improved and is now more stable. Be careful when using very old machines with little memory as the images can be pretty big.

I hope that WRP will help you use your vintage computers more 🙂

Please report bugs and issues on github!

Downloads here.