DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

A place to discuss everything Dragon related that doesn't fall into the other categories.
pser1
Posts: 1655
Joined: Sun Mar 25, 2012 7:32 pm
Location: Barcelona (SPAIN)

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by pser1 »

hello Jon,
thanks, I would like to be able to work with my Dragon and its double drive but with Drivewire at the same time
And I would be happy if every DOS command could be applied to both worlds, real and virtual
If I only had the time, I would attempt to convert the DOS commands to work with drivewire, much like SDC-CoCo does in the CoCo realm
Hopefully one of those days I would be able to begin that project one command at a time

cheers
pere
fridgemagnet
Posts: 89
Joined: Mon Nov 24, 2014 8:33 pm

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by fridgemagnet »

Similar thoughts had crossed my mind and I have done something similar a couple of times in the past. When I built my RAM disk project, I prototyped a system whereby I did the classic D64 copy-everything-to-RAM then patched DOSPlus to redirect the (unused) drive 4 to the RAM disk - see the code at the end of this:

http://www.onastick.clara.co.uk/rdisk.htm

A modified version of something like that would theoretically give you access to one drivewire disk.

I also did something similar with what I referred to as my DOS Extender (as p/off a networking project) which redirected all sector requests into packets sent over a parallel link although with that approach you'd loose access to the local disks.

Still doesn't give you the HDB-DOS type solution of accessing a raft of floppy disks but may be a reasonable starting point.

Rgs,

Jon.
pser1
Posts: 1655
Joined: Sun Mar 25, 2012 7:32 pm
Location: Barcelona (SPAIN)

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by pser1 »

Hi Jon,
thanks for this explanations ... this is really very, very interesting!
I had begun some time ago by using map1 (all RAM) where I copied the Basic and the Dragon Data DOS v1.1c
There I intercepted these two routines: ReadAbsoluteSector and WriteAbsoluteSector, I had some code there and when the used drives were 1,2 they were treated as physical drives and 3,4 as DriveWire virtual ones.
It worked out very well for easy commands, but I found that DSKINIT, for instance, used WD2797 commands that work with tracks instead of sectors,
so only a call for every track :(
I patched that and got to initialize a disk without problems, but then COPY from a physical disk to Drivewire did create problems ...
Sometimes arrived at the intercepted code a sector number out of bounds and if I didn't control that, then drivewire gracefully expanded the VDK
so that the requested sector number exists inside!
All in all it was a bit of a nightmare, and as I joined a big software conversion project, I left those trial works on standby waiting for 'better times' ...
Hopefully I will go back to them along this year.

I will have to get a copy of the software info in that link. It promises to be very interesting (pity our days don't have 48 hours ;-))

cheers
pere
fridgemagnet
Posts: 89
Joined: Mon Nov 24, 2014 8:33 pm

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by fridgemagnet »

Sounds like you've done pretty much everthing I did then. I seem to recall DOSPlus had a "write track" call in the indirect jump table that I had to patch for my RAM disk variant (in order to get the initial directory written as part of DISKINIT). Don't remember anything about spurious sector numbers but then those early 1.x DOSs were known to have a plethora of bugs.

Now what would be really helpful is if we could get our hands on the original assembler sources for one of the DOS variants (I'm a little surprised none have ever surfaced for the archive), then you could put the necessary mods in far easier to create something akin HDB-DOS.

Rgs,

Jon.
pser1
Posts: 1655
Joined: Sun Mar 25, 2012 7:32 pm
Location: Barcelona (SPAIN)

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by pser1 »

Hi Jon,
There are a few assembler source files but neither as commented as the unravelled CoCo series.
I am attaching here what I have found in my PC folders, not sure if they are the very last version, but they do help a bit.
I hope the file names are self descriptive

If anybody had a better source (or simply a different one), it would be very welcome, too ;-)

cheers
pere
Attachments
__superdos-e6-02.asm.zip
(25.38 KiB) Downloaded 379 times
__superdos-e6-03.asm.zip
(27.91 KiB) Downloaded 367 times
_ddos12.zip
(17.06 KiB) Downloaded 375 times
_dgndefs.zip
(1.98 KiB) Downloaded 372 times
pser1
Posts: 1655
Joined: Sun Mar 25, 2012 7:32 pm
Location: Barcelona (SPAIN)

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by pser1 »

Hello, Jon,
have you got the DosPlus4.9 source code or a commented unassembled file?
Is there a user/programmer manual for this DOS?

I would like to compare it to the SuperDOS and DDOS12A to choose the one that could make things easier to convert it to something like the HDB-DOS

thanks in advance

cheers
pere
KenH
Posts: 182
Joined: Fri Oct 12, 2012 9:50 am

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by KenH »

Hi Pere,
Ciaran has posted the disassembled source code of DosPlus4.9 on his website: http://www.6809.org.uk/tmp/da/dplus49b/
and Jon posted the DosPlus user manual here: viewtopic.php?f=4&t=4780#p12810
pser1
Posts: 1655
Joined: Sun Mar 25, 2012 7:32 pm
Location: Barcelona (SPAIN)

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by pser1 »

Hi Ken,

pleased to hear from you again!
I have downloaded all that info, I'm thinking of getting into that old project again. I will try to alternate it with The Hobbit conversion, where I have about 40% of work done.
But there is still quite a lot of code to convert and test!

cheers
have a nice weekend
pere
pser1
Posts: 1655
Joined: Sun Mar 25, 2012 7:32 pm
Location: Barcelona (SPAIN)

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by pser1 »

Hi Jon,
finally I had the time to work again with these dweebs (FLO2V and V2FLO)
I added, as you suggested for DosPlus4.9, the needed code to update the number of sectors x track before each floppy disk access.

I have modified the code so that now it 'understands' and 'treats' right the infamous disk single sided double density (80 tracks x 18 sectors = 1440 sectors -> 360K)
I have created on my Dragon64 one of each kind of disk (180-360ss-360ds-720) and copied them to VDK on the PC through DW4
Later I have done the same but in the other direction ... until the dweeb has succeded in all four cases.
Discs containing OS-9/NitrOS-9 get copied too in both directions.

I have not yet tested them with DosPlus4.9 but I will try to do some tests along the week-end.

The FLO2V dweeb exists in two flavours, the normal name NEEDS the VDK file to exist previously on the PC (DW4 doesn't yet create it)
FLO2VC creates the VDK on a server that accepts the command "OP_NAMEOBJ_CREATE"
The V2FLO dweeb has just one version.

You will find attached the dweebs as well as the source files.

cheers
pere
Attachments
V2FLO v8.3 - Source.zip
(5.27 KiB) Downloaded 378 times
V2FLO v8.3.ZIP
(651 Bytes) Downloaded 375 times
FLO2V v6.2 - Sources.zip
(12.88 KiB) Downloaded 366 times
FLO2V v6.2.zip
(1.54 KiB) Downloaded 366 times
fridgemagnet
Posts: 89
Joined: Mon Nov 24, 2014 8:33 pm

Re: DWEEBS - applications for DWLOAD - DriveWire

Post by fridgemagnet »

Hi Pere,

Thanks for those. I did briefly mod your code a week or so ago to check out the DOSPlus "special" and it seemed to work but I will check out your new versions when I have a moment. At present I am attempting to put my D64 back in it's original case - given the amount of additional hardware etc. I'd built over the years, I re-housed it into a PC chassis in the mid 90's. Given that most of my hardware is no longer functional :( (probably dodgy solder joints) and going forward (given the flexibility of DW) I don't really need 3 floppy drives, I've decided to put it back in it's original box. Once I get that all wired up again, will be back in business.

Rgs,

Jon.
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