Idea: science packs for schools?

[François Revol]

On 26/11/2016 01:21, Paul Boddie wrote:
> They actually have a room of BBC Micros at Bletchley Park for schoolchildren
> to use, showing them what computing used to be about and confronting them with
> things like BASIC and maybe even assembly language (although I doubt that they
> really have time for BASIC tuition let alone assembly language).

Oh, and there's a BASIC that runs on GNU/Linux also:
http://gambas.sourceforge.net/en/main.html

> It is actually possible to do new machines based on such CPUs because they are
> still in production. I guess that was originally the vague idea behind the
> Raspberry Pi - the instigator prototyped it using Atmel AVRs (similar to the
> ones used in the Arduino), I think - and the users would have had a "bare
> metal" experience similar to the microcomputers of old. However, the project
> picked up that Broadcom SoC and the rest is history.

Some ppl are doing it for ORIC:
http://oric.club/atmostrat

>
> There are other "microcomputer" or "retrocomputer" projects such as ELLO 2M:
>
> https://www.crowdsupply.com/yellow-beak-computer/ello-2m
>
> These employ relatively small amounts of memory and microcontrollers, but
> that's enough to run low-level code or some form of BASIC. Interestingly, and
> a reminder to everyone about the value of Free Software, that particular
> project experienced problems using a proprietary BASIC and an apparently
> uncooperative developer which could have had serious consequences for the
> fulfilment of the rewards of the crowdfunding campaign in question:

Oh and there are gaming consoles, like the Pico8, and the BitBox:
http://bitboxconsole.blogspot.fr/p/blog-page.html

François.