=============================================================================== Volume 1 Issue 5 July 1989 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- _____ _____ ____ ____ ___________ / | / | | | | | | _____ \ / |/ | | | | | | | \__\ / /| /| | | | | | | | / / | / | | | | | | | | / / | / | | | | | | | | ____ / / | / | | | | | | | | |__ \ / / | / | | \ \_______| | | |_________\ \ |___| |/ |___| \____________| |________________\ __ __ ____ ______ _____ ____ | \ || / __ \ --,,-- |,--- //--\\ ||\\ || || || || || \\__ || \\ || || || || |,== ---\\ || \\|| ||__|| || ||___ ___// || \_| \____/ || |____ ___/ The Official Newsletter of: The Motorola Users Group of London =============================================================================== =============================================================================== Telecom Time =============================================================================== July 1989 MUG Notes Page 1 Motorola Users Group of London 1989 EXECUTIVE PRESIDENT Stan Bischop 500 Osgoode Dr. #122. London N6E 2G9 668-7277 VICE- PRESIDENT Gerry Davis 1053 Frances St. London N5W 2L8 453-8686 SECRETARY Judy Daviau 500 Osgoode Dr. #122 London N6E 2G9 668-7277 TREASURER Sheila Smith 11 Bridle Path London N6Y 2H1 672-4913 APPOINTED POSITIONS MEMBERSHIP CO-ORDINATOR Judy Daviau 500 Osgoode Dr. #122 London N6E 2G9 668-7277 NEWSLETTER EDITOR Sheila Smith 11 Bridle Path London N6Y 2H1 672-4913 P.D.LIBRARIAN Diane Gubbels R.R. #1 Mt.Brydges N7G 3H8 264-1648 PUBLIC RELATIONS Gerry Thomas 232 Oakland Ave. London N5V 4H1 659-1374 B.B.S. SYSOP Wayne Morrison 1089 Chippewa Dr. London N5V 2T8 451-7217 NEWSLETTER PUBLISHER Wayne Morrison 1089 Chippewa Dr. London N5V 2T8 451-7217 TECHNICAL ADVISORS Stan Bischop 500 Osgoode Dr. #122 London N6E 2G9 668-7277 Gerry Davis 1053 Frances St. London N5W 2L8 453-8686 Wayne Morrison 1089 Chippewa Dr. London N5V 2T8 451-7217 MUG Line B.B.S. 24 Hours Daily 300/1200 Baud N-8-1 451-7216 DISCLAIMER The opinions expressed by the authors are not necessarily those of the Motorola Users Group of London, the editors, or the club members. While we try to make sure that all software and hardware projects in this newsletter have been tested and do work, we will not be responsible for any damage to your own personal equipment resulting from using information contained in this newsletter. COPYRIGHT NOTICE Contents of this newsletter are copyrighted 1989 by the Motorola Users Group of London. Reproduction by any means other than for the personal use of members without prior written consent is forbidden. Other non-profit computer clubs may make use of the enclosed material as long as written acknowledgement is made of the source. MANDATE This newsletter is published by and for the Motorola Users Group of London. This club has no affiliation with the Motorola Corporation. This club is a non-profit organization for anyone that may have an interest in Motorola 68XX and 68XXX based microcomputers and the use and exchange of information about these machines. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 2 Table of Contents Page Item ==== ==== 1.....................List of Officers and Mandate 2 ................... Table of Contents 3.....................Telecom Comments(looking at another BBS) 4.....................Peeks Pokes & Execs(two more pages) 6.....................RainbowFest Report by Kevin Darling 10....................Understanding Error Messages Part 3 14....................Tech Tips(installing a second drive) 16....................True DMA(have a look at this) 22....................Reviewing DynaSpell SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS The Motorola Users Group of London sponsors two special interest groups (SIG's for short). The beginners SIG meets on Tuesday nights at Wayne Morrison's (1089 Chippewa Dr.) starting at 7:00 P.M. The advanced SIG meets at Sheila Smith's (11 Bridle Path) Wednesday nights also starting at 7:00 P.M. Whether you have just started out or you are an experienced hacker, there should be something of interest for you! July 1989 MUG Notes Page 3 TELECOM COMMENTS by W. Morrison Over the last few months, we have been having an in depth look at our own BBS system, the MUG Line.Among other features, we had a good look at how the files area and message areas all work. Now we are going to talk about some of the other BBS systems in the London area. Strathroy BBS is a relative new-comer to this area, but interestingly enough, has more features than most of the others. As well as the usual messaging areas and up/down load bases, this one also supports the "FidoNet". "FidoNet", for those who haven't heard, is an affiliation of BBS systems accross North America which exchange messages, one system to another, in a "bucket brigade" fashion. In this way, it is possible for someone living in Southern Ontario, for example, to find out what the latest happenings are in somewhere like California. Strathroy BBS also has a message area and a file transfer area specifically for Colour Computer users. This is especially good, because with the more CoCo support that is out there, the more we all stand to gain within our hobby. To access the CoCo message base in the FidoNet area, select the doors option from the main menu. Then, when asked which door, reply with "games". At this point you will go to a menu allowing you to choose which game. Choose "SMLNET". At this point another menu giving you the choices within SMLNET will appear. Your choice here is the CoCo base and from here it is quite simple to access the messages on this message base. I have been using this area for about two months now, and I really like being able to read about the rest of the CoCo world! The other feature of Strathroy BBS worth mentioning, is the CoCo message and file area. To access this choose "J" for join conference, from the main menu. When the conference menu comes up, select "TRS" and you will be in the CoCo area. Here you will be able to read and/or leave messages to other CoCo people and also to access P.D. software from the file transfer area. One note though, the sysop has asked that ALL software on here be archived to conserve disk space, so, for simplicity's sake he has chosen to use the same archiving utilities that we do on MUG Line, namely TC 3 and PAK, for RSDOS and OS-9 respectively. The sysop"s name is Darrin Calcutt and he really seems to enjoy showing new users around, so should you run into trouble, be sure to page him! To access this system phone 264-2826 ( a local call from London), and be sure to let Darrin know that you are from MUG! Last month MUG Line had message number 1000 put on it. To celebrate that fact and further encourage its use, we had a secret contest. The first caller to post a message after number 999 received the P.D. disk of his or her choice from our library. Since some club members were aware of the contest beforehand, and were therefore not eligible, it was not until Len Fluhrer left one that this prize was able to be awarded, which it was at the June meeting. Congratulations Len! We hope to have more events like this in the future, so I hope I will be seeing you all on line! July 1989 MUG Notes Page 4 PEEKS POKES & EXECS DISK STEP RATE = 06 MS (DOS 1.0)..POKE 54989,0:55075,20:54566,80. DISK STEP RATE = 06 MS (DOS 1.0)..POKE 55212,65:55213,66 (2-SIDE) DISK STEP RATE = 06 MS (DOS 1.1)..POKE 55232,0:55318,20:54803,80. DISK STEP RATE = 06 MS (DOS 1.1)..POKE 55455,65:55456 (2-SIDE)... DISK STEP RATE = 06 MS ...........POKE 54989,0:55075,20 (64K).... DISK STEP RATE = 12 MS ...........POKE 54989,1:55075,21 (64K).... DISK STEP RATE = 20 MS ..........POKE 54989,2:55075,22 (64K).... DISK STEP RATE = 30 MS ..........POKE 54989,3:55075,23 (64K).... DISK SYSTEM IF = 14...............PEEK 188....................... DISK TRACK NUMBER.................PEEK 65353..................... DISPLAY PAGE 0 (VARIABLES)........POKE &H167,57:POKE 65480,0..... DISTO CONTROLLER CHIP X SELECT....POKE 65345,X:113,0 +.... DONKEY KING CONVEYOR..............POKE 12889,18.................. DONKEY KING ELEVATOR..............POKE 12889,2................... DONKEY KING EXTRA MEN (XX <200 )..POKE 129,XX ................... DONKEY KING EXTRA MEN (XX<200)....POKE 12904,XX (PRACTICE GAME).. DONKEY KING EXTRA MEN (XX<255)....POKE 12914,XX ................. DONKEY KING RIVIT LEVEL...........POKE 12889,10.................. DOUBLE EXTRA MEN..................POKE 4329,XX .................. DOUBLE PRINT EVERYTHING ON SCREEN.POKE 359,126:P360,162:P361,133. DRAW ANGLE (0-3)..................PEEK 232....................... DRAW SCALE NUMBER (1-62)..........PEEK 233....................... DSKINI ERROR SECTOR NUMBER........PEEK 237....................... DSKINI ERROR TRACK NUMBER.........PEEK 236....................... DUNKEY MUNKEY EXTRA MEN (XX <100).POKE 15121,XX ................. DURATION(402)PITCH(401)OF SOUND...POKE 402,X:POKE401,Y:EXEC44350. E.C.BASIC PRINTER TRACER OFF......POKE 360,130:POKE361,115....... ELIMINATE LEADING SPACE OF NUMBERSPOKE 48612,214:POKE 48613,24... ELIMINATE MINUS SIGN OF NUMBERS...POKE 48612,214:POKE 48613,24... ENABLE KEYS AFTER POKE 359,255....POKE 359,126................... ENABLE LIST AFTER POKE 383,158....POKE 383,0..................... ENABLE ROM-PAC AUTO START........POKE 65315,55.................. END ADDRESS OF BASIC PROGRAM......PEEK 27*256+PEEK28............. END ADDRESS OF ML PROGRAM.........PEEK 126*256+PEEK(127)-1....... ERASE BASIC PROGRAM...............EXEC 44313..................... ERASE BASIC PROGRAM/CLOSE FILES...POKE 2396,255 +[RESET]......... ERASE PROGRAM IN MEMORY...........EXEC 44313..................... ERROR CODES FOR DISK I/O..........PEEK 240....................... ERROR SKIP ROUTINE................POKE 401,1:POKE 403,255........ EXEC ADDRESS OF ML PROGRAM........PEEK 157*256+PEEK(158)......... EXEC COMMAND DISABLE..............POKE 32454,68.................. EXECUTE BASIC PROGRAM IN MEMORY...EXEC 44661..................... EXTENDED C. BASIC/DISK DISABLE....POKE 306,178:POKE 307,119...... EXTENDED COLOR BASIC DISABLE......POKE 298,0:POKE 303,0.......... EXTENDED COLOR BASIC RESTORED.....POKE 298,25:POKE 303,14........ EXTRA HIGH SPEED BACK TO NORMAL...POKE 65496,0................... EXTRA HIGH SPEED POKE.............POKE 65497,0................... FILE EXTENSION OF LAST DISK FILE..PEEK (2388-2391)............... FILE NAME OF LAST DISK FILE LOADEDPEEK (2380-2387)............... FILENAME .........................PEEK 446-473................... FILL BOXES WITH STRIPED PATTERNS..POKE 178,XX +LINE( ),PSET,BF.. FIRE BUTTON (LEFT) IF = 1.........PEEK 65280 AND 3.............. FIRE BUTTON (RIGHT) IF = 2........PEEK 65280 AND 3.............. FIRE BUTTONS (BOTH) IF = 3........PEEK 65280 AND 3.............. FIRE BUTTONS (NONE) IF = 0........PEEK 65280 AND 3.............. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 5 PEEKS POKES & EXECS (continued) FIRE BUTTONS READ ON JOYSTICKS....PEEK 65280..................... FIREBUTTON LEFT IF = 253 OR 125...PEEK 65280..................... FIREBUTTON RIGHT IF = 254 OR 126..PEEK 65280..................... FIREBUTTONS BOTH PRESSED IF = 252.PEEK 65280..................... FIREBUTTONS NOT PRESSED IF =255...PEEK 65280..................... FLASHING CURSOR...................POKE 41382,16.................. FROG, THE, EXTRA MEN..............POKE 12002,XX ................. FUNCTION/COMMAND DISABLE..........POKE 159,0..................... FURY EXTRA MEN....................POKE 13951,XX ................. GOBBLER EXTRA MEN.................POKE 9075, XX ................. GRAPHIC MEMORY DUMP OPEN..........POKE 359,57:POKE 65480,0....... GRAPHICS FROM KEYBOARD............POKE 359,128................... GRAPHICS PAGE 1 LOCATIONS.........POKE (1536-3071),XX(33-255).... GRAPHICS PAGE 2 LOCATIONS.........POKE (3072-4607),XX(33-255).... GRAPHICS PAGE 3 LOCATIONS.........POKE (4608-6143),XX(33-255).... GRAPHICS PAGE 4 LOCATIONS.........POKE (6144-7679),XX(33-255).... GRAPHICS PAGE 5 LOCATIONS.........POKE (7680-9215),XX(33-255).... GRAPHICS PAGE 6 LOCATIONS.........POKE (9216-10751),XX(33-255)... GRAPHICS PAGE 7 LOCATIONS.........POKE (10752-12287),XX(33-255).. GRAPHICS PAGE 8 LOCATIONS.........POKE (12288-13823),XX(33-255).. GREEN ON BLACK, LOWERCASE XX=48...POKE38341-38345,18,134,XX,18,18 HAUNTED TREASURE EXTRA MEN XX<255.POKE 2414,XX .................. HI-RES SCREEN END POSITION........PEEK (183)*256+PEEK (184)...... HI-RES SCREEN START POSITION......PEEK (186)*256+PEEK (187)...... HIGH SPEED POKE...................POKE 65495,0................... HORIZONTAL POSITION FOR X-PAD.....PEEK 65376..................... I/O ERROR DUE TO MEMORY IF = 2....PEEK 129....................... I/O ERROR DUE TO TAPE FAULT IF = 1PEEK 129....................... INKEY$ (1 A$=INKEY$:IFA$=""THEN1).EXEC 44539..................... INKEY$ CURSOR OFF.................POKE 42346,193................. INKEY$ CURSOR ON..................POKE 42346,177................. INKEY$ KEY ASCII VALUE............PEEK 135....................... INKEY$ VALUE SET TO NULL..........POKE 135,0..................... INKEY$="" EQUIVALENT..............POKE 135,0..................... INPUT CHARACTER TO REGISTER A.....EXEC 41393..................... INVADERS EXTRA MEN................POKE 7674,XX................... INVASION EXTRA MEN................POKE 7466,XX .................. INVISIBLE CURSOR..................POKE 41385,18:POKE 41386,28.... JOYSTICK FIRE BUTTONS READ........PEEK 65280..................... KATERPILLAR ATTACK EXTRA MEN......POKE 10739,XX ................. KEY <,> PRESSED IF = 223..........PEEK 342....................... KEY <-> PRESSED IF = 223..........PEEK 343....................... KEY <.> PRESSED IF = 223..........PEEK 344....................... KEY PRESSED IF = 223..........PEEK 345....................... KEY <0> PRESSED IF = 239..........PEEK 338....................... KEY <1> PRESSED IF = 239..........PEEK 339....................... KEY <2> PRESSED IF = 239..........PEEK 340....................... KEY <3> PRESSED IF = 239..........PEEK 341....................... KEY <4> PRESSED IF = 239..........PEEK 342....................... KEY <5> PRESSED IF = 239..........PEEK 343....................... KEY <6> PRESSED IF = 239..........PEEK 344....................... KEY <7> PRESSED IF = 239..........PEEK 345....................... KEY <8> PRESSED IF = 223..........PEEK 338....................... KEY <9> PRESSED IF = 223..........PEEK 339....................... KEY <:> PRESSED IF = 223..........PEEK 340....................... KEY <;> PRESSED IF = 223..........PEEK 341.......................  ´ÿn»Y  (~À This is the fest as I saw it... being in a booth most of the time, my viewpoint is probably much different than usual. I hope other people who attended will also upload what they saw and thought of things. I will just ramble through: Marsha and I got in Thursday afternoon after driving 14 hours from North Carolina. Before bed, we went across the street to one of the biggest malls in the country. I mention this mall only because we and several others dropped into a new hologram store there... and one of the dozens of pictures was the most amazing we'd ever seen. It was laying horizontally, and as you walked up to it, a full-sized lab microscope sprang into 3-D view, sticking out about a foot. You could even look into the greenish ghost-like lens and see a slide through it! Incredible. I think this hologram was $200, btw . Friday around noon, others started to show up: Kent Meyers, Tony DiStefano and Chris Rochon, Dale Puckett (without Esther!), and Gary Robinson from Tandy Towers with his wife Karen (at their first fest). The show was open from 7pm to 10pm Friday night. Gary, Karen, Marsha and I wandered through in traditional first-night fashion... you grab a copy of all the literature to look through later in your room when you have time . Altho Lonnie said that attendence was slightly down from last year, I couldn't tell. There seemed to be more booths to me, and thousands of people around as always. At fests, most everyone keeps their eyes glancing at everyone else's namebadges, hoping to spot someone you know only by name on a forum. You meet a lot of people that way. (Kent wears a jacket with his name on the back. He meets even more friends with this trick!) The Chicago fest is always easier to get around in than Princeton, as the room is a little larger. music of MIDI synths playing from several booths. Plus the Rainbow public address, which everyone hates because it totally prevents conversation when they blare out something about "Get your picture taken with CoCo Cat!", or the like. Every year we all swear we're gonna sabotage the PA system.... Many of the CoCos on display had been built into PC-clone cases. It's almost becoming hard to find a plain coco at a fest. Most of the cased ones were running OS9, while most of the normal ones were running RSDOS adventure games. Someday a smart person is going to bring out a simple-to-do CoCo case kit and make millions at one of these fests. I hope. Friday nights go by quickly, and a bunch of us ended up in Kent's room (where I keep my computer). Those who haven't seen tons of VEF pictures get to see them there, plus people bring in programs that they've been working on to get opinions and suggestions. We also hash out ideas every year in Kent's room for new hardware, etc. Mike Haaland had sent along a gfx editor he was writing for us to look at this time, and it was pretty impressive with its use of pulldown tool menus. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 7 * RAINBOWFEST CHICAGO 1989 * Saturday morning we finally had permission to use Frank Hogg's booth for the OS-9 Users Group (Frank couldn't come because of a back injury, but he decided to donate the booth to the UG - thanks, Frank!), and we opened it up about 11am. Over the weekend quite a few forum people stopped by to say hi; and we also gained about 30 new members. We had copies of Dibble's new OS9/68000 Insights book and the new MW OS-9 Catalog to look at. The Catalog and also the MW Sourcebook are free for the asking just by calling MW in Des Moines. Dibble's book is about $40, also from Microware. All are recommended reading material. Paul Ward and his friend Mark Sheffield, along with Marsha and Dick White, helped man the booth. Paul donated a lot of his "Start OS-9" books to the booth, with proceeds going to the UG. Thanks, Paul! Saturday at noon was when my "seminar" was. I had originally intended to demo some of the forum programs there. But I noticed that they had assigned me one of the bigger rooms, and I remembered from last year that no one could see a monitor that far away (they REALLY need to give us some bigscreen monitors or several tied thru an amplifier!). Plus most seminars put people to sleep when things start getting over their head. Thus I decided to try something radically different at the last moment (those there will attest to that :-). So I opened it up as a bull session, and the topics ranged all over the spectrum. Some of it was really enlightening to us. People apparently had a lot of opinions, and have wanted to speak out for a long time. Questions and answers covered: What a coco-4 should be (dual processor 6809/68000); Would they move to OSK (not unless they could run their OS9 software with another cpu or emulator); What software do people want (cheaper and easier word processors, spreadsheets, business software, educational software, more business software, all under OS-9); Is everyone addicted to the CLEAR key (positively!); Will there be a C upgrade package (probably not, tho this question is the one of the most common at fests); Is 512K enough (yes, for now anyway); Why doesn't Tandy promote the CoCo more (up to marketing, and besides which, lets face it, there are other things they make more money on, so let's just use what we have and educate users where we can); What kind of problems do you have (the IRQ wire hack would solve most of these); and gosh I wish we'd taken notes on everything! Among the people there who helped out (much thanks!) were Paul Ward, James Jones of MW, Gary Robinson of Tandy, Bob Santy of PCDOS/RSDOS xfr util fame, Kent Meyers, and Kevin Pease (who showed prototypes of his new 68070/hires-gfx OS9 board set). We truly had most of the OS9 know-how in that one room! As always, I talked about the need to join a club or get online for help. Last year at Dale's seminar I asked who was on a forum or BBS. Out of two hundred people, only 6 were. This year almost everyone was! Remarkable difference. Plus virtually everyone knew of and used Shell+ and GShell+. It seems quite a bit of the software uploaded to CIS makes its way across country in almost no time. We had an hour alloted for the seminar, but they ended up having to kick the whole place out after two hours (!) because the next seminar was due to start. Apparently, that was some kind of record. Heck, we were just having a great time, is all. People had a lot to say. It could've gone on all day long, anyway, back to the UG booth for several hours. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 8 * RAINBOWFEST CHICAGO 1989 * After the fest closed, we caught the last ten minutes of Gary Robinson's seminar on submitting software to Tandy. I wish I knew who that was in the room with the tape recorder... I'd like to get a transcript of this one! I do remember one thing: someone asked why Tandy doesn't sell developer's paks "like Apple" and Atari etc do. I had to jump in and say something myself on that one... the devpaks from those guys sell for $600-1000 and include stuff like tech info, schematics, and OS calls. "Gee, we get the OS calls in our L-II manual, and schematics for any Tandy hardware are easily available to anyone for dirt cheap", is what I said. The attendees were hugely pleased that at last Tandy had sent a rep to the Chicago fest... and they made a point of saying how much they appreciated Gary showing up. Saturday night, a bunch of us got together for dinner (and later of course ended up in Kent's room for more talk. I'm always invited to the Falsoft party, but somehow never have gone to it over the years; instead I like to get together with the forum folk). There were a dozen of us, and we told the waitress that Dale Puckett was our "Dad". To our delight, she treated him just so, all the rest of the evening ... even tho half our group had grey hair and was obviously older than he was. If that's possible . On Sunday I finally found time to get away from the booth for a few minutes. Mike Knudsen's UltiMuse MIDI software under OS-9 was verrry impressive. Everything is menu-driven, using the mouse, altho he also provides keyboard shortcut keys. The surprise of the show (to me) was Chris Burke's 256K ram upgrade... it can also be upgraded to 512K... but provides a way to start out cheaper. About $90. Owlware had "Window-Writer", a mouse-driven text-screen word processor... several people (including Kent) bought a copy, so hopefully we'll have some reviews soon. It has two cursor blocks... mouse and text, with cut/paste and a kind of clipboard. Just before the fest shut down at 3pm Sunday, they took the usual Rainbowfest group picture. In honor of Gary Robinson being at his first fest, I joined him towards the front of the group... so you might actually get to see what some of us look like finally. That's about it. By 4pm the place was deserted. We left Monday at noon. Over the weekend, I had sold about 15 copies of my book, which was enough for Marsha and I to make it back to North Carolina again (whew!). July 1989 MUG Notes Page 9 * RAINBOWFEST CHICAGO 1989 * Friends we saw there included: Simmy Turner, Rod Motto, Dave Hansen, Roger Krupsky, Larry Olson, Mike Knudsen, Eric Crichlow, Tim Wilhite, Doug Dalton, Scott Griepentrog, Chris Burke, Dick White, Paul Ward, James Jones, Steve Blasingame, Dave Philipsen, Marty Goodman, Kevin Pease, George Dorner, Larry? Strong, Rick Adams. Ron and Tracy Lammardo, Mark Griffith, Bob Puppo, and Bruce Isted couldn't make it... and we missed them! Some of the show specials that I remember included monitor stands for $1, CoCo-3's for $100, Orch-90 for $20, Multi-Vue for $25, L-II for $59. Also one-button mice were $10, two-button $39, Magnavox monitors for $250, ST251 40-meg bare drives for $299, complete 5-meg (no case) HD systems for about $125, and lots of deals on floppy drives of all types. LIST OF COMPANIES AT THE FEST Alpha Software - OS9 utilities AZ Small Computers - hard disks Burke&Burke - OS9 utils, hard disks, RAM upgrades Cer-Comp - rsdos utils, peripherals CBUG - floppy disks and accessories CoCo Connection - rsdos utils Computer Plus - Tandy hardware Delphi - network DISTO/CRC - peripherals Gamepoint - rsdos games, Rascan video digitizer Gimmesoft - games Glenside CC club - buttons, t-shirts Howard Medical - monitors, hard disks Microcom - rsdos/os9 utils, peripherals Oblique Triad - adventure games Owl-Ware - hard drives, Window Writer/OS9 Orion Tech - telecom soft/hardware Radio Shack - Tandy soft/hardware Rulaford Research - Lyra, MIDI synths Second City - os9/rsdos software, UltiMuse MIDI SpectroSystems - ADOS SRB Software - games StG Computers - os9 utils, bbs, printer dumps Sugar Software - os9 calligrapher, educational software Sundog Systems - games Zebra Systems - peripherals, rsdos tools Re-printed with Permission from Midnight Remote Data Systems 451-4769 London Ontario July 1989 MUG Notes Page 10 Understanding Error Messages Part 3 (c) May 18th, 1989 By L.G. Fluhrer 3rd This month we will examine the largest group of errors in your system known collectively as Input Output Errors (I/O Errors) and their relationship with peripheral devices such as your printer, tape recorder, and disk drive. The word peripheral means "an electronic or mechanical device not part of the basic processor". Thus, just about anything you plug into your computer is a peripheral device. To save space I will just refer to peripheral devices as devices in this article. The key to this definition is mechanical since most devices you use are mechanical in nature, print heads move across your printer, disk or hard drive, joysticks and keyboard are mechanically operated etc., basic stress of continual use generally means that at some point in time these devices will malfunction. Then there are mechanical errors caused by human error joysticks not plugged in correctly, no paper in the printer, invalid commands given to modems or other devices. Given the number of things that could go wrong with each device and the fact that the average computer system could include almost a infinite number of devices it is easy to see why I/O errors make up the largest group of error messages. In fact about 90 per cent of all error messages refer not to the computer but, to I/O device errors. This is generally true for almost all computers there are however, some computer systems, usually older models, that have only a handful of I/O errors such as nonrecoverable system failure, and I/O error. Note that when RS DOS was developed they were in the process of providing better operating systems however, the CoCo was still left with the old I/O Error covering a wide range of device errors. In contrast modern operating systems display one error message clearly identifying both the device and the error in question thus, the operator doesn't have to waste time tracking down the problem. This fact doesn't help the RS Basic programmer much as he/she will still have to deal with the ancient I/O error. The first step in dealing with this error is to know which device you are using (tape, disk, or other), then follow the following check list: Tape I/O errors Is the tape record plugged in correctly to CoCo and recorder? Plugs Black ---- EAR Lrg. Grey ---- AUX Sm. Grey ---- REM Unused ---- MIC The cable going to the power supply sometimes works its way loose so make sure its in properly. If the computer finds the program and then gives an error shortly after loading try adjusting the volume up or down on your record. (Should be either P on CCR-82 or about 80 per cent of full volume). Try loading in another copy or program if successful the tape may be stretched or damaged. Turn the recorder upside down. If the recorder works upside down buy a tape cleaner and clean the heads on the tape then try it again right side up. If it still only July 1989 MUG Notes Page 11 works upside down you may have to replace the belts inside the recorder. If it is just one program take the tape out of the recorder at the point of the error and look at the tape for any bends or flaws, if present you may never be able to recover the data stored at that position of the tape. You should only use high quality tapes or computer tapes for programs, ideally leaderless tape. Cheaper tapes often are not coated with enough magnetic material causing drop outs. The tape itself is sometimes made of poor quality materials that stretch, kink or bend when played. Note, you cannot save a program on a tape leader as it has no magnetic coating, any program saved on this area will be lost and any remaining part of the program recorded will report I/O error. Even with high quality tapes you should always fast -forward the tape through completely before using, this action will remove any kinks in the tape. You may want to try this on a tape with an I/O error as it may remove the kink and the error. Check cables for breaks. End of tape - the computer will attempt to save a program even after it has ran out of tape, if you try to play back a program saved past the end of the tape you will get an IO error. Always beware of the position of the tape when saving near the end of it. BEWARE OF CATS AND DOGS THAT LOVE TO EAT RS CABLES. DISK DRIVES Is the disk in the drive correctly with the drive door completely shut. Can you read other programs on that disk. If so try a backup copy and suspect a flaw on that disk. Try loading another disk. If it works there may be a number of problems, a completely bad disk, bad sector, bent disk, disk not fitting its jacket correctly, drive at wrong speed, contact with a magnetic object. Bad Disk - carefully put your fingers through the center hole in the disk and gently turn it while looking at the exposed surface area of the disk. Any visible scratches means that the disk has be scratched and the data has been destroyed on the scratched area. You need a Disk Zap program to recover this disk and chances are you will only recover those parts of the disk that are not scratched. Bad Sector - each disk is divided into sectors and these can easy be destroyed by by poorly written Machine Language programs , dust and scratches. Also it is possible that the disk was Formated incorrectly but, went Undetected by either the operator or the operating system. Again a Disk Zap program is needed to recover from this disk. Bad Directory Track - Mechanical failure since track 17 contains the directory it is the most used track on your system. The greater use means the greater the chances for the read/write head to mechanically malfunction over this track and destroy it. Bent Disk-warped disks may not show any signs of being bad.These disks will not lay flat in the drive however, and will not spin. If you can't turn the disk manually that is stuck in its jacket or bent.Try to slide the disk so that the center hole is actually in the center of the disk. If you can turn the disk now the disk was just stuck in its own jacket and the disk is more than likely ok. Bent Disks are the worst type of disk error because their warped shape prevents them from turning in the drive making Disk Zap programs useless.Wrong Drive Speed -Every computer July 1989 MUG Notes Page 12 user should have a program that checks the speed of your disk drive,CoCo drives are set to run at 300 rpm +/- 10 per cent. Some drives never go out of speed. These drives use a large plastic wheel to control the speed of the drive. Others however, are belt and pulley systems that tend to go out of speed over time. If the drive is not up to speed follow the following steps: 1. Power down the entire system. 2. Remove all the screws holding the case on your drive and lift the case straight up. 3. If you have more then 1 drive you will have to remove the top drive making sure not to damage any cables. 4. Make sure the drive is a pulley type drive and not a fixed plastic hub. 5. You should see a small adjustment screw on the board on the opposite side of the drive is a pattern of white and black bars running around the hub for eyeballing the speed. If you have a drive check program you should not have to use this. If you don't have a drive check program then carefully turn the drive on its side making sure that all cables are in place. Turn on your system. If it hangs up turn the system off at once. If not insert a blank formated disk in the drive and type: POKE &FF40 ,1 - this turns on your drive motor. If you look at the marks at the hub you will see a flashing strobe of black and white bars. If the disk is at the correct speed it will appear to be stopped, if not and the bars are moving use a small screwdriver to turn the adjustment screw slowly either left or right. Reverse your direction if the bars move faster instead of slower, again when there is no apparent motion the drives are at the correct speed. Warning do not touch anything other then the adjustment screw. WP - Write Protect Error, Os-9 error 242 the notch on the disk is covered with a write protect tab preventing you from writing to this disk. Some 3rd party software vendors sell disks without notches to prevent you from altering their programs you can add this notch using another disk as a template and a single paper punch. Place the template over the disk and lightly mark the location with a pencil. Slide the disk over to the left and punch a hole the same size as the write protect notch on the template disk. Slide the disk back so that its centred and try again. Be careful in the above procedure as you could destroy the disk if you punched into the disk or touched the magnetic coating of the disk. If you still get a WP error then you punched in the wrong location. Place the template disk again over the disk and verify that it is in the right place. Trim with the punch or scissors. DF - Disk Full, OS-9 error 248 Media Full, this disk is full replace the disk with a new one and resave. If you do a dir on the old disk you will see the program name in the directory but, it may not be all there. Again loading this program may result in an IO error, and is equal to the IO error that results when you run out of tape on your tape recorder. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 13 OS-9 Device not Ready, Error 246, RS Basic (nothing happens device does not function and the keyboard locks up.) PRINTER - is the printer connected, power turned on, paper loaded, online switch turned to online** and alert lights off**. ( if you have this feature)** DISK DRIVE - plugged in and power on. AE - File already exists, OS-9 error 218 File already exists. This is one error message I wish RS DOS and OS-9 didn't have as it is by far the biggest pain to CoCo users there is. You will get this error if you try to copy a program to another disk that has the same file name and extension on it. While it sounds like a good idea to stop people from erasing programs consider this, you should always make backups of your programs. If you are making your own programs and data files chances are you will have several working programs from different programming sessions. Now you are allowed to save that program to disk over top an existing disk without this error but, you cannot copy it to your backup disk at a later session unless you backup the whole disk. Your only choice is to load it into memory, switch disks and save it again to the new disk. I would like to see this error replaced with something like this; File Already Exists on Target Disk (A)bort,(C)ontinue,(R)ename If you type A or the word abort then the save or copy will stop, Continue will continue to save or copy the file over the old one and (R)ename would let you enter a new name to save the file and save it providing that this new name didn't exist on the disk also. AO - Attempt to open a data file that is already open. You can only open a file once per program unless you close it first. Unlike the last error this one really make sense. After all why would you tell someone or your computer to open a door that was already open? It make no sense in a program to open and close files more then once, if you find yourself doing this you should either rewrite the program or change from sequential to direct access. BR - Bad Record Number yet another out by one error from last months column, record numbers are like dimensions on a disk they only have a certain valid range that you supply when you created a direct access file. Record numbers are always positive integer numbers example (1,2,3, ....). DN - Device number error RS DOS values are -2 (printer), -1 (recorder), 0 (computer screen), 1-15 Disk Drive.Any other value is invalid. OS-9 users can only use devices that have been entered correctly in the Device Table. You can see what device you have in memory by typing Mdir. You will get an error 216 path name not found if the device isn't in the table even if it is plugged in and working correctly. While that about does it for this month we will look at more I/O errors next time. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 14 Tech Tips by W. Morrison I think that the most popular type of hardware modification that I have been involved with over the years has to be the addition of a second disk drive to the Tandy horizontal drive 0. The horizontal drives, such as the FD 500, FD 501, and FD 502 were designed with the installation of a second drive in mind, and since Tandy chose to use IBM compatible drives for the CoCo, this particular upgrade is much easier to do than one would expect. First you have to purchase an IBM compatible 360K 5 1/4 inch bare floppy drive. Once this has been located, your next step is to remove the case from your Tandy drive. This is done by removing six screws, three on each side of the case, located at the bottom edge.After these have been removed, and the electrical plug has been pulled from the outlet, lift the case straight up to expose the inner workings of your floppy drive. Now remove the blanking plate that was covering the upper half of the front and store it away. You are now ready to install your new drive unit in the case. I almost forgot to mention one thing though, you will need four screws the right size to fit in the four mounting holes in the two sides of the new drive. Most sales outlets which sell these drives also have the mounting screws, but if you really get stuck, I have a limited supply. You may also need a new ribbon cable connector. I will explain shortly why, so bear with me for now, and if one is needed, you can get it before you install your new disk drive. There is one other potential trouble spot. If you own an FD 502, I have some good news, and I have some bad news. The good news is that you acftually have a double sided drive, although it can only be easily accessed under OS-9. The bad news is that there is a VERY good chance that the power connector in your case will not match the new bare drive unit's connector. Bear with me (again) and I will tell you how to hardwire the new drive to your system at the end of this article, although it will require you to do a bit of soldering. So, to repeat it briefly, the parts list is as follows; 1 x IBM compatible 360K 5 1/4 floppy disk drive 4 x drive mounting screws 1 x 34 pin ribbon cable connector (if needed) (Radio Shack part number 276-1564) Start by positioning the new drive in its intended spot in the case. Now, have a look at the back end of it. You should see a connector there for an edge connector to plug into. If it is on the same side (left or right) as the edge connector on the Tandy drive, you are all set. Simply cut the tie-down on the spare ribbon connector on the cable in the back of the case, and plug it in. If they are on opposite sides, you will need the second ribbon cable connector that I mentioned earlier. Attach it about six inches further up the cable so that the numbers on the mouth of it match up with the numbers on the existing plugs. Then plug it in so that the numbers match those stenciled on the printed circuit board of the new drive. At this point your data lines are now installed and ready for business. Re-route your ribbon cable so that it does not get in the way, and prepare to install the power supply connector. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 15 If you have an FD 500 or an FD 501, take the moulded white plug coming from the power supply and plug it into the new drive's power connector. It is polarized, so it will only fit one way. If you cannot plug it into the connector on the drive, try turning it upside down. There is one last chore to handle. Somewhere on the printed circuit board of the disk drive, there will be a set of drive select jumpers marked either DS0, DS1, DS2, and DS3, or DS1, DS2, DS3, and DS4. Set the jumper so that the second drive is selected, either DS1 or DS2 respectively. Now use the four mounting screws and install your new drive into the case. Replace the cover, and you should be in business. Power up your system, put a disk in drive 1 and do a "DIR 1". If all went as planned you should have some action. If not, retrace your steps and look for the problem. If you have an FD 502, there is one more complication. You will need to hard wire the power supply cable to the drive. You will need four nine inch lengths of 18 hookup wire for this. There are four wires running between the drive and power supply. You will have to solder one end of each of the four wires to your bare drive. Attach them to the solder pads where the power plug is attached, making sure not to bridge any of the contacts. Check which wire is soldered to which pad by tracing the original plug to where the four pins were soldered. The following diagram will help. Position the drive so that you are looking into the front of the power plug, so that you can see the pins inside. It should look like the following; ********************** * * * 1 2 3 4 * * * ************************** The numbers one through four represent the four pins inside. Notice that I have drawn this plug with the taper upwards. If yours is mounted in the opposite way, simply reverse the numbers. Pins 2 and 3 are ground connections. Pin 1 is the 12 volt line and pin 4 is the 5 volt line. Use a test meter to determine which lines match these on the power supply and solder them in place. Then continue as above and finish mounting the drive in your case. Power up your system and all should be running smoothly. As with my other "little" projects, should you run into a problem, or want to ask a question, I can be contacted through our BBS, at any club or SIG meeting, or at home, most week night evenings. If you take it slowly, this is not all that complicated a modification. Having two disk drives sure is nice! July 1989 MUG Notes Page 16 *transferred from hardcopy to softcopy by M. Warcholyk in *order to be easily distributed to all. December 25, 1988 ADVANCED DISK DRIVE CONTROL --------------------------- by Paul B. Pollock Opening Comments ---------------- STOP! This detailed discussion assumes a working knowledge of the Motorola Bulletins listed below; 1). MC6844 DMAC, description and design notes. 2). AN905 Application Notes, A Transparent DMA using a MC6809e and a MC6844 DMAC. Overview -------- It is clear, that DMA control of disk operations is a superior form of file management. What will be described here, will be an extension of that theme. To clear some logical confusion, I'd like to preface by noting the extreme differences between true Direct Memory Access, and track/sector reading (with software interrupt processing) methods. Track/Sector reading methods, as used in the latest disk controllers (for the Tandy Color Computer), are not DMA. They still require CPU control of the entire transfer. 1 byte at a time. The increase of performance (using these methods), is in 2 areas. First, because the disk driver software controls the CPU via software interrupts versus the previous hardware interrupt methods, disk access has few detrimental effects upon other processes. Secondly, there is a marginal increase in throughput, since the track/sector is moved from a memory buffer (within the controller circuitry) to the RBF buffer. This yields performance similar to disk-cache access, for that block, within the buffer. This is because the disk drive itself is left out of the loop, for actual transfers between the controller and system ram. Throughput is roughly 1001 better via this method. The above listed increase in throughput, assumes no other processes controlled via the same level of software interrupt. The effect of this type of interrupt conflict is detrimental to overall system operations, and in some cases, actually decreases file management throughput. This is caused because since the drives are now controlled via a software interrupt; drives no longer enjoy exclusive CPU attention during a drive access. Examples of software conflicts, that may cause reduction in performance are; Communications Software, which makes use of software interrupts in the handling of I/O buffers; multiple drive accesses from more than one process, especially common within a multi-tasking environment; process descriptor service routines, which make use of interrupts for inter-window July 1989 MUG Notes Page 17 communications. True DMA resolves many of these interrupt processing conflicts, because it has control of the primary data/address buss during the transfer of data. It therefore bypasses the CPU, for transfers of up to 256 bytes of data at a time. It then signals for an CPU acknowledge, to continue its progress (or terminate at the proper time), and return primary control of the system buss to CPU. The idea of using the 'dead-clock' period of CPU activity, to operate the DMA transfer; is ideally suited to multi-tasking operating system operations; this as described in AN905. Its advantages stem from being able to yield DMA transfers, essentially concurrent to CPU access. This entirely frees the system from interrupt process conflicts. It requires an advanced RBF manager and disk driver, but it is apparent that the access efficiency is well worth the effort. 'Dead-clock' access is nothing new to the Tandy Color Computer, since it is this time period that the MC6847 (or GIME, in the case of the Color Computer-3) does video memory screen updates and refresh. It becomes obvious that circuit designers of disk-drive-controllers, drastically under-estimated this function, and overlooked it, for disk file management. EXTENSIONS UPON A THEME ----------------------- Initially, I'd like to describe the hardware changes required, to increase disk-drive throughput, even further than through DMA methods. I wish to preface by indicating that this is an extension of the methods described in AN905. It does not replace it. Firstly, what will be necessary, is (in the case of the Tandy Color Computer), is to remove the MC6809e from the PC-card, and socket the solder pad for installation of a small 'piggy-back' card. This to hold the MC6809e, and to allow the drawing out, of the following cpu lines; BA, BS. All other lines are already on the system buss. This modification will not require the normally accepted lines like TSC or BUSY. Additionally, what will be necessary, is to abandon primary CPU control of the data buss, during disk drive access. This method is the primary stumbling block to throughput within the OS-9 environment, as used in the Tandy Color Computer. While it might appear that this is the intention of AN905, I wish to stress the absolute need to go even further in this regard. To ensure this level of isolation, it will be necessary to control the DMA transfer by substituting the MC6844 DMAC with another true CPU IC! To do this requires the proper selection of the 'slave' processor. There are 2 processors that have both the required circuit simplicity, AND the internal microcodes which would facilitate efficient file management. The following lists examples of these CPU IC's; 1). Zilog Z-80 processor. 2). Motorola MC68008 processor. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 18 The 2 characteristics that should be considered (and which were used for the above suggestions) follow; 1). 8-bit external data buss. This isn't necessary, but makes interfacing simple. 2). MOV microcode instruction.This Assembly Language instruction is used to move an entire block (256 bytes), with 1 instruction. This would yield enourmous throughput, in our application. It should be noted that if less than optimum throughput is desired, any high quality processor may be used. Software compatibility may be implemented by the use of the MC6809e processor as the 'slave' processor selection, but would not yield as high a performance level as an IC with the block-MOV facilities. The advantages of the scheme, described above, are as follows; 1). Allows true 'smart' file transfers, and allows the slave-cpu to update process and address math files (within main cpu system areas), without the need for main-cpu attention. 2). Allows the slave-cpu to handle drive transfers (under its exclusive control) entirely within the controller. This might include, but not be limited to, the following; a). Disk formatting. b). Disk backup. c). File copying. If we assume a Motorola computer chip, is selected, as the slave-cpu, even more features may be built into the controller. Some are listed below; 1). A 'mini' OS-9 operating system might be built into the slave-cpu control ROM. It could contain only those modules absolutely required for disk management, but could gain access to the main buss (during primary system start), to get drive-descriptor data. This would allow equal drive hardware selection flexibility, compared to previous systems. 2). Direct OS-9 type control communications between cpu's might be implemented, to facilitate software design. SOFTWARE CONSIDERATIONS ----------------------- It is useful to note, that the following comments may overlap software, which may already be present, in existing systems. But are necessary as useful considerations for the modification and extension of existing modules, as well as the creation of necessary new modules. In most cases, what is required for correct operations, between main-cpu and slave-cpu, is in the area of cooperative status and data reporting. Some of the data already exists in table-data, within the system, and software already exists to manage these tables. Methods are also in place to manage capitulation routines, to handle conditions such as , file transfer errors, acceptance of command, and errors related to transmission of commands. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 19 What follows are 2 examples of file management, at the main-cpu level (with slave-cpu comments). This will give software designers some guides for the other routines, required for the design or redesign of the entire disk management menu. 1). An example of a slave-cpu local function. --------------------------------------------- Format /d0. 1).SHELL parses OS-9 system call for a disk drive format. 2).Driver calls descriptor for drive hardware data, and communication register data.This is redundant, but necessary for file compatibility and signal parity. 3).Driver reports ready to initiate. 4).OS9p1 checks need for memory access, finding none, now checks for I/O buffer requirements. Finds need for I/O buffer calls for process buffer between main-slave cpu's. 5).System sends buffer control opening routine commands to appropriate managers. 6).Driver forwards command to slave-cpu. Initiates signal intercept handling routine, to flag active, at slave-cpu communication status TRUE. 7).OS-9 main system, resumes normal operations. 8).Slave-cpu sends command ACK, via signal intercept, already initiated. 9).Slave-cpu mini-OS9 system disk driver now checks command menu, finds valid file, looks at module directory for specified descriptor. Now sends additional ACK/NAK to main-system, based on descriptor present and valid for available hardware resources. 10)Slave system now checks standard error table while initiating drive start and track/sector write. 11)Sends additional ACK/NAK based on good/bad write status data. 12)Slave-system now initiates (assuming all operations good) disk read/verify routine. At any error detected, slave-system reports error, and/or; 13)Slave-system reports completed. Returns drive status control to main-cpu control. 14)Main-system now initiates normal task closing routines. This includes closing the signal intercept, and relinquishing memory required for I/O buffer, etc. 15)Main-system resumes normal operations. Note: at any error, detected by slave-system, entire command process will be terminated, and system status will return to WAIT status. Main system will return to status before command was initiated. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 20 2. An example of a transfer from drive to system. ------------------------------------------------- Load /d0/filename. 1).Main-system Shell parses command to load file into memory. 2).Driver calls descriptor for drive hardware specific data, as well as communications register data. Same note as previous example. 3).Driver reports ready to initiate. 4).Managers initiate request, to slave-cpu, for file size data; for filenamed. 5).Slave-system initiates normal OS-9 directory check for filename, and on valid, checks module header for filesize. If no header, forks to F$CRC, to readout actual file length. 6).Depending on go/no-go, sends either the appropriate error, or sends (via the comm-path opened) the actual filesize. 7).Slave-system (assuming all is go) awaits further instructions. Is now in 'hot-ready' status, as is already aware of file-transfer emminent. 8).Main-system, upon receiving filesize, initiates main memory map, memory allocation, and start-load address table math. 9).Upon no errors (ie, out of memory), sends data packet to slave-system, with command to load file, offset load address, communications mode data/status, etc. 10)Main-system returns to normal operations, after making final memory reservations, and initiating proper comm-buffers and signal intercepts. 11)Slave-system now accepting complete command packet, initiates drive operations. 12)Drive operations commence with initiation of local file-read calls. Since comm-buffers are already opened, all that remains is to synchronize to 'dead-cycle' periods. This is the time that slave-cpu had absolute control of main-system buss. 13)File transfer initiated, as a normal OS-9 file read and load to memory. 14)Upon any read, or slave system error, slave-system terminates file reading and RBF functions, and initiates abort proceedings, closing of RBF buffers, and final report of errors to main system. OR, upon completed file transfer; 15)Initiates closing of slave-system RBF buffers, preparations for normal WAIT state. Signals for final data packet. Reports error status, if none, reports load good. Closes out command, clears all transient data, goes to Wait state. 16)Main-system ACK's receipt of transfer packet, final updates memory allocation data, and carries out normal memory functions, in the handling of module data. Returns to normal operations, by closing all tasks initiated to service drive/file commands, and returning to main-loop. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 21 FINAL NOTES ----------- It is clear that the above process examples are incomplete and marginally simplistic. However, they should overview the primary areas of cooperation required between main/slave cpu's. There are other methods to get these things done, or to load/cold boot the system. For instance, the slave-cpu could use the same bootfile as the main-cpu, and unlink any modules which are not a primary OS9 module, or does not use RBF or CCDISK, etc. Then reload and transfer the bootfile to the main-system, allowing it to have final control, upon correct load completion. This allows system room, within the slave-system map, for large-scale cache buffers or other improvements. It becomes clear, after thinking on the previous, and lengthy comments; that a controller of this magnitude, will not be cheap or simple to design. But should not cost more to design and build than products, already present in the marketplace. Controllers of extreme cost include; a fully populated Disto/CRC 'no-halt' controller with multi-function mini-card; the Frank Hogg Laboratories 'Eliminator'. Both these cards, fully populated cost in excess of $225! This allows much design room for a 'truly' better way. Smart controllers, of this general construction have been done by other system designers. Commodore used this essential hardware approach, with their controller circuit card, in the 1541 disk-drive unit. The only reason it was inefficient was that it had a lousy operating system, and was linked to the main computer, via a 600 baud serial port. The controller contained a complete micro-computer, with a complete set of command primitives, for the servicing of drive functions. And the whole drive unit costs less than $150 retail! While there are many commercial business rationales to be applied to this example, it is clear that our system (the Tandy Color Computer) can not only afford a better drive controller approach, but seems economically feasible. I hope these notes can be used to further the hobby, and the business of Tandy Color Computer systems, hardware, and support. Any comments, on this report, should be forwarded to the author via the following methods; Mailing Address- Paul B. Pollock 8330 Haskell Ave. Sepulveda, CA 91343 DELPHI- Authors' BBS- The Hound & Lion BBS 300/1200 baud. 7E1. (818)895-1016 July 1989 MUG Notes Page 22 REVIEWING DYNASPELL by Michael Warcholyk Well I'm back again, and its nice to know that my articles are being much appreciated by many of you. If you don't get bored of them then you will be allowing me to keep very busy. Believe me I don't mind at all, anyone thats as crazy as I am about their Coco is a friend of mine, so its worth the effort. Before I begin reviewing Dynaspell I would first like to clear up a few things from my previous article regarding some undocumented functions in DynaStar. Well guess what, those functions aren't undocumented, I just didn't see them before! Since I now know their functions let me explain them to you. The F- Enter if File function which I already explained to you is in this section and of course nothing more need be said about it(well if you forgot what it is then look in my last article). ]- Display on/off is used to toggle screen updating. This would for example speed up many editor functions when using macros such as global search and replace. If this macro were invoked the entire process would be displayed on the screen which would mean a couple of things; the prompts would be displayed on top and whatever is defined in the macro would be displayed step by step as well. This obviously slows things down so by placing "]" in the macro screen updating would first be turned off and then at the end of the macro another "]" would be put in to turn it back on. Xon/Xoff is used to support terminals which require control of data transmission, either to end or resume transmission of data; something most Cocoists don't need to worry about. The last thing that I am happy to mention is that you can save your macros to disk. All macros that you wish to regularly use are placed into an initialization file called "ds.init". You could actually have many different startup files by using the name format "ds.NAME", in which you could have for example a file which contains macros for editing letters with special tabs, margins etc. Now that things are cleared up I finally can begin telling you about DynaSpell! Before I had DynaSpell I thought I probably wouldn't ever need a spelling checker that much but, it turns out that I use it whenever I know that other people will be looking at my text. Its amazing to see the number of errors I make, usually silly ones but none the less mistakes which could prove rather embarrassing if in the wrong hands and with DynaSpell I would say that most if not all are corrected. The only thing you have to remember is that this program is a spelling checker and nothing more. It doesn't correct your grammar or singularize your plurals ect. it just checks for bad spelling. What I am going to do is to give you an over view on how it works and then finish off with a few comments to try to help you decide whether this is what you would want in a spelling checker or not. July 1989 MUG Notes Page 23 When you first start DynaSpell you are given a choice of three different options as to how you would like to check your spelling. One mode is for checking it interactively and two other modes are for checking spelling automatically. Both automatic modes are basically the same and allow you to check the output later so you could if you want go for a coffee break or do another job on your system. The only difference between these automatic modes is that with one the output goes to a printer and with the other the output goes to a disk file. After selecting the option of your choice DynaSpell will automatically begin checking the text by comparing it with the words found in its dictionary. After it is finished you will then be told how many words were in your text and how many were not found in the dictionary. You are then presented with a menu of options. You could then look at all your suspect words either in context or one-by-one; you could also have another dictionary called up perhaps even one which you made up yourself! The neat thing about making your own dictionaries is for those of you that use unusual words such as in law or medicine etc. that a dictionary could be made using these words. When you are looking through the list of suspect words which DynaSpell has collected you have the option of making an immediate change, looking in the dictionary for any similar words or if you are undecided you can then flag the word so you can look at it again later or finally approving it with the added option of putting it into your personal dictionary. The only thing which I noticed that didn't work as was supposed to was if you accept the word as is then you can either press [A]ccept or hit enter but, it doesn't work that way. The only thing that the program accepts is enter, neither capitol or lower case [A] seems to work. Even after you made your decision to change a word you can later change your mind again if you decide that it was spelled right in the first place. Later you write the corrections to disk which updates your text file you can then check another file or you may choose to access the OS9 shell for one reason or another actually you can access the shell anytime you want to. Now even though DynaSpell works great with DynaStar it doesn't mean that you couldn't use it with any other text processor. In the menu you have a choice of looking up mistakes in context either with DynaStar files or Stylo files so you know it works with Stylo too. I tried using it with the OS9 text line editor and it works fine as well, so I don't see any problems any other editors unless they save files in some strange format. The only real problem which I had with DynaSpell was that the disk containing the 102,000 word dictionary disk was on a double sided disk and at the time I only had a single sided drive so I thought the disk was bad cause I couldn't (of course) access it. But after getting a new drive everything was okay and I could then have a great time looking at all of my dumb errors and finally having the chance to change them before someone else had to tell me about them. Once again I found this program bug free(with that one exception) and it did everything it is supposed to do. So if you are in the need for a good, flexible and fast spelling checker consider this one. And if you have some questions about it or any of my articles then please ask me and I will try to help out.Also even though I seem to think that I have the ability to put an article in each month, don't believe me; have I succeeded so far?