Introducing (and interest check) AirTalk: Wireless plug-and-play LocalTalk dongles

[twelvetone12]

Viola', this is my code up to now. I copied a check for the 0xA650 trap (_SerialPower) from the mac rom, since I saw there were other traps related to PMgrOp that could have the same values as 0xA650, and those cases it skips to the original routine directly.

 

[twelvetone12]

I made a prototype that connects to a modern machine and it works! I can connect to mini vMac, copy files and all! (I wrote about that on the TashTalk thread). @cheesestraws you mentioned there are ways to patch ROM early during boot, I'm quite curious to know more since maybe this "internal AirTalk" could really be a thing!

 

[cheesestraws]

there are ways to patch ROM early during boot

Try changing the file type (not resource type!) of the extension to 'scri' - this should load it before almost anything else, and before AppleTalk initialises. This is, strictly speaking, an abuse of the script system loading system, but what's life without a few hacks?

 

[LaPorta]

A minivMac AirTalk? Fascinating…

 

[techknight]

I made a prototype that connects to a modern machine and it works! I can connect to mini vMac, copy files and all! (I wrote about that on the TashTalk thread). @cheesestraws you mentioned there are ways to patch ROM early during boot, I'm quite curious to know more since maybe this "internal AirTalk" could really be a thing!

Since this thread is gotten to become a huge tl;dr, I am interested.

What machine specifically?

Edit: Also, does anyone have a build of minivmac that works with this on Windows?

 

[LaPorta]

I’d like the same info as TechKnight: what is the interface, and what are the instructions to do this?

 

[twelvetone12]

I'm trying to build a "condensed" version of @cheesestraws' AirTalk that fits in the modem port of a powerbook 1xx series (I'm using a pb100, but it should work on the 150 and 170 too? I'm not sure about the others). It is a bit challenging since the modem port in hardcoded to be just a... modem port, but with a bit of help I was able to communicate to a TashTalk, which was the complex part of the project. Right now the "prototype" is really just a bunch of wires sticking out of my machine, I plan to make a proper PCB with pic and esp so is somebody is interested we can test them!

 

[techknight]

I'm trying to build a "condensed" version of @cheesestraws' AirTalk that fits in the modem port of a powerbook 1xx series (I'm using a pb100, but it should work on the 150 and 170 too? I'm not sure about the others). It is a bit challenging since the modem port in hardcoded to be just a... modem port, but with a bit of help I was able to communicate to a TashTalk, which was the complex part of the project. Right now the "prototype" is really just a bunch of wires sticking out of my machine, I plan to make a proper PCB with pic and esp so is somebody is interested we can test them!

Well if you publish your work on that, I am interested.

The macintosh portable should work straight up since its basically a PB100

 

[cheesestraws]

The Mini vMac bits are just the normal LToUDP built into the beta of Mini vMac.

Edit: Also, does anyone have a build of minivmac that works with this on Windows?

I don't have a Windows box to build you one, unfortunately. Any volunteers?

 

[twelvetone12]

Yes my plan is to make a GitHub page with everything, once I have something that is more than a ball of wires and random code
The portable is basically identical, but I think the connector has a different pinout and the board dimensions are different. Should work without any problems I think.

I did the hack suggested by @cheesestraws and my extension loads first thing at boot, and localtalk correctly works at startup! It crashes MacPPP for some reason but well... I also tried it on my linux box running mini vMac and it is MUCH faster there. I could not have it working with multitalk through (I had plans with netatalk but that will wait).

I tried compiling mini vMac on windows, but it seems it requires "real" visual studio and I only have mingw so I could not even open the project.

 

[cheesestraws]

I did the hack suggested by @cheesestraws and my extension loads first thing at boot, and localtalk correctly works at startup!

Hooray!

It crashes MacPPP for some reason but well...

I'm not totally surprised. I doubt it expected that...

 

[twelvetone12]

yeah I guess it opens the modem port by default and then... kaboom! But who needs MacPPP when one has localtalk In any case we have the source for it, a patch could be a project for the future.

 

[twelvetone12]

@cheesestraws Did you try AirTalk with the ESP32-WROOM-32E-N4 (E revision)? It seems the D revision is obsoleted (le sigh). The only difference I can find is that GPIO6-11 are not routed out, and that it uses the ESP32 v3. They say it is a drop in replacement (skipping over the infinitesimally small detail that they don't route out five gipos anymore...), but if you know it does not work I will spare buying them to try

 

[cheesestraws]

Did you try AirTalk with the ESP32-WROOM-32E-N4 (E revision)?

it looks like the last batch I made used these, at least according to my jlcpcb order history, and those worked fine.

 

[twelvetone12]

Fantastic! It is also in stock there.