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“TRS-GPT” : ChatGPT from a TRS-80 Model III Computer built in 1981

Aug 26, 2023 - druid77.github.io
The article is a personal account of the author's journey to connect a vintage TRS-80 Model III computer, built in 1981, to the modern internet and interact with OpenAI's ChatGPT. The author, a NASA JPL employee, describes his childhood fascination with computers and games, his dream of having an intelligent conversation with a computer, and how he restored a TRS-80 computer, added a hard drive emulator, and connected it to the internet using a TRS-IO device.

The author then explains how he wrote a client-side program in BASIC and a server-side program in Python, hosted on an AWS EC2 server, to pass text queries from the TRS-80 to the OpenAI server and return the responses. After making some modifications to the BASIC program, the author was able to successfully interact with ChatGPT on his TRS-80, fulfilling his childhood dream. The article concludes with a link to a video demonstrating the final working system.

Key takeaways:

  • The author restored a TRS-80 Model III computer from 1981 and connected it to the internet to interact with OpenAI's ChatGPT.
  • The restoration process involved cleaning and repairing the keyboard, and installing a FreHD module to emulate a hard drive.
  • The author used a TRS-IO device to connect the TRS-80 to the internet and interact with OpenAI's ChatGPT, overcoming challenges related to the computer's age and limitations.
  • The final system allowed the author to interact with ChatGPT on the TRS-80, fulfilling a childhood dream of having an intelligent conversation with a computer.
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