Creating a ZMachine Linux terminal

I know this is crazy as it sounds, but that’s okay… I like crazy. I am going to buy me a cheap mini pc, x86 in structure, no more then 2 cores, no less and no more then a gig… And prehaps just 60 gigs of space. The LCD output I am looking for is no more then 10 inches, no less the 7 (I doubt I could find it easily)… USB keyboard and optical mouse of course… SD card reader. Mostly for pseudo-classical feel of programming my zcode games with ZILF using a Ubuntu server, with Mono complete, a lightweight WM (Ice)… Might go for Tiny Core Linux. Also adding either DOSBox or just DOSEmu, cause, DOS. Plan to get this jewel assembled by next month for my own private development reasons.

After testing Mono (actually Mono complete), I realized I don’t need WINE. So, I am thinking, should I use Arch for my Linux distro for my pseudo-zmachine terminal pc? Or would a Debian based Server version be optimal? Not even considering a windows manager, but then again, I could create my own simple Linux gui shell for windows managing my terminal. Anyone got any ideas?

decided to go next month or by June the Raspberry Pi 2 or 3 route… Evidently Mono is on Raspberry Pi 3 (might even be 2) for Raspbian. It works just that well with me, the technology is pretty much new, and I can customize the Linux in such a way I could relate the zmachine releases with the Frotz for Pi and run it from bash scripting upon boot up. Just to be on the safe side I will update this project on the general discussions so I won’t be yelled at just in case it was meant for that :stuck_out_tongue:

My vision of the past brought to my developing present :slight_smile:
zmachine.jpeg

Interesting…

Can we get a bigger image of that thing? It looks very interesting.

If you really want the old-school look, just dispense with the GUI entirely and have Frotz display to the text console.

youtube.com/watch?v=e_5NvcH_p_g I found the top pick on the that link on youtube actually, David… And yes I do agree, might as well dispense of the gui go hard CLI/LUI.

I can make out a JVC logo. I guess it’s a studio monitor of some sort.

my guess is that it is a pretty much a repurposed if not on a dare or a hobby interest to create a zmachine terminal on their own volition. I do believe JVC made a MSX2, so it might even be outside the US due that what I understand, most of the countries that get the MSX and MSX2 is Japan (the manufacturer), some parts of Europe and Brazil (but not limited to). US is the only thus far that I know of that has not seen a true if not official MSX or MSX2 Home Computer since it’s development in the 80’s and it’s end in the 90’s.

Really cool. For an old-school look, run frotz for curses. It’s also a particularly faithful Z-machine implementation (I’ve been finding irritating corner-case bugs in nearly all the others).

I think the most “authentic” look would require a fullscreen graphical terminal using one of these fonts:

int10h.org/oldschool-pc-fonts

So basically start X11 with the only application in it being a terminal (like xterm) with the font configured appropriately, and perhaps with mouse support disabled.