The Backroad to Civilization

RetroChallenge 2024

I'm baaaaaaaack!

It's been a number of years since I entered the RetroChallenge (and a lot

more since I've actually participated), and the timing couldn't be better.

I read a couple of posts on Mastodon regarding the RC starting today, and

thought to myself, "CJ/Sparc/PB5300/SepAge or whoever the Hell you are

today, you have two or more projects you've been putting off for ages, why

the Hell don't you get off your lazy ass and do them for the RC? If

nothing else, you can make people laugh at you."

Admitting I had a point, I signed up. I'm a glutton for punishment.

"So, Mr. Jerk, what are these things you've been putting off?" you might

ask.

"Thank you for asking," I might answer.

My projects are pretty straightforward: back up the aging hard drives in

my beloved Sparc IPX and also-ran Powerbook 280c, and moving everything

relatively intact to SD card solutions on both machines.

The Powerbook 280c should be relatively easy. All my stuff is archived on

a 2gb JAZ drive, so if backup/restore fails, I can just do a fresh install

of Mac OS 8.1 and copy my stuff over manually.

My little sun4c Sparc IPX might be a little tricky, considering I don't

know what the Hell I'm doing most of the time... and this is the one

machine where I really, REALLY don't want to resort to a reinstall. It's

running a fully-patched Solaris 7 (current to when I stopped using it in

the 2010s), is chock full of stuff from the long-dead SunFreeWare site

that I'll probably never find again, and really don't want to build from

source... or to blow a ton of money subscribing to UnixPackages for the

same stuff they gave me for free when they were SunFreeWare. Not that I'm

bitter or anything.

But anyway, to recap: Project involves moving HDs to SDs on a Sparc IPX

and Powerbook 280c. I'll be detailing my progress here on my Gemini

capsule but I'm not certain I'll mirror the content on my gopher site.

Parhaps if there's sufficient demand. [EDIT: I did anyway]

Anyway, off to the races.