I came across what I believe to the earliest extant example on the internet of Lego building instructions using an old (pre-Draw) language format. It's in a nearly 30-year-old Usenet message that can be
seen here.
It builds a rabbit from the 1545 polybag set of 1992. I thought it would be fun to try and re-create the build using LDraw.
I have a snapshot of what I think it's supposed to look like, but I admit I wasn't able to get there from the instructions exactly. Maybe some of you will have better luck? If you try, I'd like to see what you come up with!
Paul Gyugyi is the author of LDLite and goes way back in the virtual LEGO community.
(2022-12-29, 3:00)Orion Pobursky Wrote: [ -> ]Paul Gyugyi is the author of LDLite and goes way back in the virtual LEGO community.
Yes indeed. Strangely enough, my Usenet days coincided with the heyday of a.t.l/r.t.l and the emergence of LDraw, but they also coincided with my Dark Age. So I've been catching up only recently on the history of Lego as an internet hobby; things would have been quite different if I'd made the connection when these things were current!
(Biggest hole in the annals seems to be the LCAD mailing list, which AFAIK was never archived…)
(2022-12-29, 3:34)N. W. Perry Wrote: [ -> ]Yes indeed. Strangely enough, my Usenet days coincided with the heyday of a.t.l/r.t.l and the emergence of LDraw, but they also coincided with my Dark Age. So I've been catching up only recently on the history of Lego as an internet hobby; things would have been quite different if I'd made the connection when these things were current!
(Biggest hole in the annals seems to be the LCAD mailing list, which AFAIK was never archived…)
Funny thing. I was just searching Usenet the other day for old LDraw releases. Our records stop at the 1997-16 release so I was seeing if I could find something earlier. Alas, no.
(2022-12-29, 4:39)Orion Pobursky Wrote: [ -> ]Funny thing. I was just searching Usenet the other day for old LDraw releases. Our records stop at the 1997-16 release so I was seeing if I could find something earlier. Alas, no.
Just for nostalgia's sake, here is
James's first post announcing his new drawing program…
(2022-12-29, 15:29)N. W. Perry Wrote: [ -> ]Just for nostalgia's sake, here is James's first post announcing his new drawing program…
Is the original ldraw.exe archived anywhere, I wonder?