wtm@neoucom.UUCP (Bill Mayhew) (11/16/88)
A person here has asked me to connect some "game" controls designed to plug into a //c or //e rear panel to an older ][+ machine. The manuals for the ][+ are pretty decent, but the books for the //e really STINK (no pin-outs even for the external connectors!). Heck, the old ][ manuals had the whole schematic and ROM contents. I'd really like to strangle the editor of these //e manuals. ~150 pages on how to use the Prodos file utility, but not even a peep about how to do anything substantive with Prodos. These manuals are for a relatively old //e; hopefully apple came out with something better after the machine was on the market for a while. I still have the old red 8.5 by 11 inch reference book; that's my favorite (from the days of the non-autostart F8 ROM!). I would be most appreciative if somebody could [preferably] email or post the pin-outs for the mouse connector. I figured that I would make a little pigtail to go from the DE-9P on the game control over to the 14 pin DIP socket in the ][+. I know the pin-outs for the DIP socket; no problem there. Thanks in advance, --Bill *3D0G return mail path: ...!lll-winken!scooter!neoucom!impulse!wtm
fiddler%concertina@Sun.COM (Steve Hix) (11/17/88)
In article <1411@neoucom.UUCP>, wtm@neoucom.UUCP (Bill Mayhew) writes: > A person here has asked me to connect some "game" controls designed > to plug into a //c or //e rear panel to an older ][+ machine. The > manuals for the ][+ are pretty decent, but the books for the //e > really STINK (no pin-outs even for the external connectors!). Well, there are //e manuals, and there are //e manuals... > Heck, the old ][ manuals had the whole schematic and ROM contents. Don't forget that when the Red Book was done, there wasn't any software out for the ][. No disk drive. No file system (DOS wasn't a real operating system, but then a ][ didn't need much to be useful). Comparing the ][ with the //e in some areas is literally comparing apples with <mumble>. You couldn't fit all the needed information for the //e in a single manual as you could for the ][ in the Red Book. Btw, if the RB looks as though it was done by copying papers swept off of engineer's desks...it was. Literally. But the schematics sure were nice. > I'd really like to strangle the editor of these //e manuals. ~150 > pages on how to use the Prodos file utility, but not even a peep > about how to do anything substantive with Prodos. Would you like to learn something about how manuals are produced? Here goes anyway: The writer (the editor does not write the manual, although one will save the writer's bacon during the writing process by catching spelling/grammatical/content errors) seldom gets to dictate what goes into a manual, at least completely. Software and hardware engineers provide raw information (some of them *really* raw, others write up their stuff well enough to be writers themselves. Management, especially marketing, say what has to go in and what *can't* go in. Even if leaving something out makes no sense, the writer may not be able to muster enough support to get it in. Remember that Apple is, and always has been, a marketing-driven company. The image is more important than the content. This is why you got idiocies like the Apple ///. I like the Apple ///, I've had several, and people who own them *still* like them. So why was the Apple ][ mode of the machine emasculated as it was? Marketeers (who shall remain nameless, some of them were otherwise very nice people) were afraid that a real Apple ][ emulation in a $3000 machine would dry up all sales of the $1200 Apple ][. Stupid. There are lots more people who could afford $1200, than those who could afford $3000. Whatever else they may have *wanted* to buy, the bank account can only do so much. (It would have been simpler to put in a full ][ emulation in the /// than the restricted one that got put in, btw.) So here you have a machine that was supposed to be plug-and-play, with software packages available for most applications. OK so far. Apple wanted to have third-party developers write lots of software for the ///. Fine. Then why did I and another writer have to yell and scream for nearly two years before somebody upstairs OK'd the writing of the Apple /// SOS Device Driver Writer's Guide and the SOS Programmer's Guide? By the time they got out, the /// was dead. Politics. Feh. Back to manuals. After all this, you've got packaging constraints: there is a limit to how many pages you can put into wire-o bindings. (Don't get started on larger formats, or three-ring binders and whatnot. We looked at all of them, and their disadvantages outweighed their advantages.) So the information ends up going out in several manuals. Why weren't they shipped together with each system? Note that Apple is concerned with shipping large volumes. Ten (more like $50) of extra manuals add up over a million or more systems. Most of the manuals will never be read anyway. So the lower-volume manuals have to go some other way. (This, note, is The Way Things Are, not the way that the writers at Apple wanted them to be. You have *no* idea of the ferocious battles waged on this subject alone.) The more technical manuals eventually were printed by Addison-Wesley and sold by them through bookstores, and the occasional odd dealer. > These manuals are for a relatively old //e; hopefully apple came out > with something better after the machine was on the market for a while. > I still have the old red 8.5 by 11 inch reference book; that's my > favorite (from the days of the non-autostart F8 ROM!). Sigh. They did. Years ago. The last two projects I worked on at Apple were revisions of the //e and //c Technical Reference Manuals. I included programming information in the //e version covering the extended 80-column card and Super Serial Card, too, since nearly every system went out the door with both. (Beats having four or five manuals open on your desk while trying to program.) Oh, yes; full schematics, pinouts for external and internal connectors, and ROM listing. They're published by Addison-Wesley. I think the manuals have seen one more revision since then, but maybe not...the //e hasn't changed much since then. Me at Apple? No thanks. Nearly five years of fighting political battles, not knowing for 90 days at a time where the company really was going and whatnot was more than enough. I like where I am much better, thank you. (But I still enjoyed working with some of the best people in the Valley. And playing with what were once some of the most fun toys, too.) > I would be most appreciative if somebody could [preferably] email or > post the pin-outs for the mouse connector. I figured that I would > make a little pigtail to go from the DE-9P on the game control over > to the 14 pin DIP socket in the ][+. I know the pin-outs for the > DIP socket; no problem there. I nobody else does it, and I don't forget, I'll pull down the manuals from my shelf at home and dig out the information. What you want to do is a piece of cake. Trust me. > Thanks in advance, You're welcome.
matthew@sunpix.UUCP ( Sun NCAA) (11/19/88)
>I would be most appreciative if somebody could [preferably] email or >post the pin-outs for the mouse connector. I figured that I would >make a little pigtail to go from the DE-9P on the game control over >to the 14 pin DIP socket in the ][+. I know the pin-outs for the >DIP socket; no problem there. What you are referencing has nothing to do with a mouse connector. Only the Apple //c has a combination Joystick, Mouse port. The DE-9 connector on the Apple //e is strickly a joystick port. Any way the pinout you are looking for is: DE-9 signal DIP-16 1) switch 1 [3] 2) +5vdc [1] 3) ground [8] 4) pdl 2 [7] 5) pdl 0 [6] 6) switch 2 [4] 7) switch 0 [2] 8) pdl 1 [10] 9) pdl 3 [11] I hope this helps you out. (btw: I did this mod to my own Apple ][plus when I purchased my Apple //c) -- Matthew Lee Stier (919) 469-8300| Sun Microsystems --- RTP, NC 27560| "Wisconsin Escapee" uucp: {sun, rti}!sunpix!matthew |