apple-ii-matrix

A BASIC program that produces a Matrix-like display on Apple II computers.

Photo: Scott Beale / Laughing Squid on Flickr

If you don't have an old Apple machine or emulator handy, try this:

• copy the source
• paste it into Joshua Bell's Applesoft BASIC in Javascript.
• press the Run button

If you do have an Apple or emulator, you need to get to the Apple's BASIC prompt, and then type in the lines as shown. There is no text editor; simply typing in a line preceded by a number adds it to the program buffer. Then type RUN.

history and sightings

I first wrote this at Vancouver Mini Maker Faire, in June 2012. I saw an old Apple II running a lacklustre demo and I decided to bust out some quarter-century old skills. The owner of the machine graciously let me use it for a half hour or so, and with the help of some other bystanders we got this:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/brevity/7429579820/

Next, I saw an Apple II at Panic Software in Portland, during the XOXO Festival in September 2012, and decided to type it in. That's where the picture above was taken.

October 21, 2020: The @AppleIIBot account on Twitter will post recordings of an emulator running programs communicated by tweet. I managed to get a version of MATRIX into less than 280 characters, recorded here as MATWEEX

https://twitter.com/NeilKNet/status/1319060653064089600

March 23, 2021: @bruno185 created a similar program in Apple II assembly, Apple-II-another-Matrix, and was kind enough to credit this project for the inspiration