Video: C Programming on System 6 - Parsing RFC822 Dates

I wrote a utility function to parse RFC822 dates/times sent by the IMAP server, which then converts them to a UTC time. In this video, I hook it into the IMAP parser and add a resource string for the local timezone offset setting, so these UTC times can then be converted to a local time and displayed in the message list.

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Video: C Programming on System 6 - Intro

I've been writing an IMAP client for and on my Mac 512Ke over the past many weeks. Taking inspiration from Andreas Kling's excellent YouTube videos documenting his development of the Serenity operating system, I thought I'd start screencasting some of my work.

This video is the first of hopefully many and presents a quick introduction to System 6, HFS resource forks, THINK C 5.0, and a look at some of the progress of my IMAP client so far.

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OpenBSD on the Microsoft Surface Go 2

I used OpenBSD on the original Surface Go back in 2018 and many things worked with the big exception of the internal Atheros WiFi. This meant I had to keep it tethered to a USB-C dock for Ethernet or use a small USB-A WiFi dongle plugged into a less-than-small USB-A-to-USB-C adapter.

Microsoft has switched to Intel WiFi chips on their recent Surface devices, making the Surface Go 2 slightly more compatible with OpenBSD.

surface go on desk with keyboard attached

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A USB Loader for the Cidco MailStation

Last year I wrote about the Cidco MailStation and how I was using it as a Z80 development platform. One of the biggest hurdles to running code on them is that it must be uploaded over the MailStation's parallel port with a LapLink cable and some custom software (although it's certainly easier than having to pull and flash a chip).

I recently created a USB data loader device that allows for easier development from a modern computer and implements the MailStation's custom data encoding routines in its firmware.

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Arduino Development on OpenBSD

Back in 2017, I bought an Arduboy, a fun little Arduino development system which integrates an ATmega32U4 8-bit CPU, 32 KB of flash storage, 2 KB of RAM, a 128x64 pixel OLED display, some buttons, a speaker, and a battery in a Gameboy-like package.

OpenBSD had an old Arduino package available without the Arduino IDE, and it instead included a custom Makefile for end-users to build off of for compiling projects. But it was all pretty old and crufty and kind of sucked the fun out of tinkering with a new piece of hardware.

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Touchpad, Interrupted

For two years I've been driving myself crazy trying to figure out the source of a driver problem on OpenBSD: interrupts never arrived for certain touchpad devices. While debugging an unrelated issue over the weekend, I finally solved it.

It's been a long journey and it's a technical tale, but here it is.

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