WoS Links

[PeterJ]

Just to let you know that WoS are having some infoseek issues caused by some old code and their server upgrade. This means that our links from each title (pre 2014) to WoS will not work until this is fixed. We don't take any files directly from WoS so nothing else is impacted.

It also appears that WoS are doing their own version of our 'little bugs in the database', and are upto the letter T. It's a pity this work is being duplicated. The choice though is obviously theirs.

For information, this is the update from Lee.

https://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/ ... eek#latest

[Stefan]

We have no timescale on this.

It's only been four years underway, no need to start rushing things now.

[Ralf]

They are weird guys. They fail to do any real work on database for years and when finally someone does the job for them, they start duplicating it.

But today it brings little emotion to me. The may do whatever they want and as long as it takes as I have my place to enjoy Speccy stuff here.

[Pegaz]

No surprises ... at all.
I still remember Einar's endless and futile attempts to reach someone's enormous vanity...
Only one doubt has been going through my mind ever since - did Martjin really willingly give wos into the hands of such a person.
I don't buy that, and I never will...
But, I don’t care too much... The real wos spirit is already here, anyway..

[DouglasReynholm]

They are weird guys.

I spent an hour tonight reading about some of the people involved over there.



Glad this place exists.

[hitm4n]

I never go there any more. I followed that site and news and Martijn for 25 years or more, bought his WOS CD when he was doing those back near mid 90's. Been here ever since it opened and what a better place it is. That other site is dead to me. Its an incomplete, broken mess.

[Alessandro]

I still post on the WoS forum, and I peruse it often due to the immense amount of information it holds, from code snippets to reference; I consult WoS's documents section regularly, and use its infoseek for software which is not downloadable from here yet. That just to point out that WoS is still a valuable resource - and to me, essential - despite the lack of maintenance (so to speak) that went on after Martijn Van Der Heide ended running it. I am glad that WoS still exist.

[DouglasReynholm]

That just to point out that WoS is still a valuable resource - and to me, essential - despite the lack of maintenance (so to speak) that went on after Martijn Van Der Heide ended running it. I am glad that WoS still exists.

A good counterpoint. I'm only faintly aware of the 'drama' (before this evening at least) and certainly have no first hand experience. But I get a sense of sadness that such a great resource has ultimately been seemingly left to waste, though clearly it is still of some utility.

I think I first found out about WoS when I got (properly) on the internet in '98, when I naively thought at the time "I wonder if anyone remembers the old ZX Spectrum?", then was delighted to find out I could play games in my browser, albeit it a bit 'clunky'. It was a great resource for old publications too, I remember getting a few books on assembler there back in 2013 as well, but was never a member and not active on the forums at all.

I found this place at the beginning of its existence, Nov 2017. I think it was because the ZX Next boards had just shipped and I was looking for like minded individuals who had backed the full version. I lurked for a good 4 months before finally joining up. I'm very glad I did.

Edit: memory fail. I lurked 16 months!

[R-Tape]

Peter, Einar, I sent you both a PM over on the WoS forum.

Oh hold on, no I didn't, because Lee removed that privelege from us, for utter bollocks reasons, a few years ago!

[pavero]

Really ridiculous.

My attitude about the WoS situation is clear. I declared it several time publicly. The biggest mistake in Martijn's live was to entrust WoS to the hands of Lee Fogarty. A really sad story how to burry 20 years of wonderful work during "one day".

[PeterJ]

There is certainly a good deal of information collated during the 90s and 00s as you say [mention]Alessandro[/mention] which needs preserving. It's good there is a site backup on archive.org. The heyday of the forums also need to be preserved

[moroz1999]

All software as I expect is also backed up on zxart.ee. If something happens to archive.org copy, at least this can be automatically pulled back via API.

... and use its infoseek for software which is not downloadable from here yet.

Could you please provide an example of such software? I would like to check if it's available on ZX-Art.
BTW, always wanted to ask: what is reason of some software titles being unavailable for download here on Spectrum Computing? Except for denied distribution for a tiny percent of titles, what is it? Is it a lack of disk space, lack of time to copy it to local servers or something else?

[PeterJ]

[mention]moroz1999[/mention]. We do have a locally backed up copy of the 70GB archive.org zip in case of emergency. We can obviously share this with other site owners if needed.

Regarding not all software being available, there are a handful of companies that we don't distribute yet, as well as anything denied. These are where the company is still trading, or has been bought up over the years, and that company is still trading. We are actively contacting companies where we can. Trying to find the right person to approach is difficult.

We actually have had some success with getting agreement for a small number of titles which were previously denied on WoS. Also, we have excellent links with Zenobi and others who actively alert us to new releases.

Ideally we would like to host everything, and that time will come as awareness of the site, and what we are trying to achieve increases.

[Ralf]

I still post on the WoS forum, and I peruse it often due to the immense amount of information it holds, from code snippets to reference; I consult WoS's documents section regularly, and use its infoseek for software which is not downloadable from here yet. That just to point out that WoS is still a valuable resource - and to me, essential - despite the lack of maintenance (so to speak) that went on after Martijn Van Der Heide ended running it. I am glad that WoS still exist.

Yes, WOS forum holds a lot of valuable information. It may be hard to find something with current forum engine but in such cases we have people like Alessandro

Also still quite a lot of good people post there. Discussions generally aren't as interesting as before but rarely you may find some gem.

[PeterJ]

Looks as though infoseek is working again which is good news.

[PQR]

I really wish that the current maintainer of WOS would replace the homepage.
The original design from 2003 (seen below) was tailored to work at 800x600 pixels with a limited palette of colours.



On the current WOS homepage elements such as the title and hardware picture have been completely removed.
All that's left is just a very empty and butchered design.

[PeterJ]

Hi [mention]PQR[/mention],

There is a testing version that they have been working on for some years which is here:

https://live.worldofspectrum.org/

https://live.worldofspectrum.org/infoseek/whats_new

It looks as though is is still very much WiP though.

[Ast A. Moore]

While it’s sad that the Speccy image is now gone, I actually like the overall design on that home page. You get a clean, bird’s-eye view of everything and it loads instantly. The new design is too loud and involves a ton of scrolling. Could never get used to it.

[PQR]

Could never get used to it.

To me that pretty much sums up the whole WOS experience after Martijn left.