Over the last few years, ABug have hosted a fascinating series of talks over Zoom on a wide range of retro Acorn and BBC Micro topics. We posted about a few of them last Christmas.
 
Just in time for this Christmas, ABug have been busy over the last few weeks posting some more of the talks to their YouTube channel, just in time for escaping from another load of Christmas film repeats on TV.
 
This time around, there's talks on a variety of topics, including building RISC OS 3.71 from its original source code, software presevation and rescuing data from old BBC Micro discs, stories from BBC Micro developers and more.
 
The full list of videos is on the ABug YouTube page (with more still to come in the coming days!), but here's a few of our favourites to get you started:

 

On software preservation...

A Brief Introduction to Disc Imaging - Phil Pemberton
We've posted before about the Acorn Preservation Team's efforts to make sure old software is preserved and archived. In this talk, Phil Pemberton gives an insight into the disc imaging process.
 
A State of Flux: How analog techniques were used to recover the Repton 3 source code - Chris Evans and Phil Pemberton with Matthew Atkinson
Chris Evans and Phil Pemberton discuss the recovery of the original source code discs for Repton 3 (among other BBC Micro titles) from a set of floppy discs that we've spoken about previously.

On building RISC OS...

Building RISC OS 3.71 - Phil Pemberton
After the complete original RISC OS 3.71 source code surfaced in late 2020, Phil Pemberton explores and demonstrates how to build a working ROM image from it.

On Econet...

Computing in Schools, Econet & SJ Research - Andrew Gordon
A look at Econet, how it came to be and how it was used in schools.

On BBC Micro emulation...

BeebEm Beginnings - Dave Gilbert
Dave Gilbert talks about how BeebEm came to be and gives a history of the BBC Micro emulator.
 
The B-Em Emulator in 2021 - Steve Fosdick
Steve Fosdick gives an update on the B-Em BBC Micro emulator.

On games...

Explaining Elite Part Two - Mark Moxon
Part two of Mark Moxon's deep dive into everyone's favourite BBC Micro game, Elite. This time covering the disc and 6502 Second Processor versions. Part one is here, in case you need to catch up.
 
Creating Elementum and Electrobots for the Acorn Electron and BBC Micro - 0xC0DE
0xC0DE hosts a talk on how the recent BBC Micro/Electron game release Elementum and (then) upcoming Electrobots were created.
 
From Pixels to Parcels - Matthew Atkinson
Matthew Atkinson, author of the BBC Micro and Electron versions of Repton 3, Tempest, UIM and others gives a talk on his history of creating games for the BBC Micro and beyond.
 
Orlando M Pilchard and Aardvark: 8 bits, Archie and Me - Nick Pelling
A conversation Nick Pelling about the history of Aardvark Software and the man behind such well known BBC Micro games as Frak! (an updated version of which with more levels and updates is now available on Steam.