Autostart tape program?

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Sdw
Posts: 7
Joined: Sun Jan 05, 2020 8:17 pm

Autostart tape program?

Post by Sdw »

So, to load and start a binary (with exec address set) from cassette, I do:
CLOADM:EXEC

But I recall that the last time I had my Dragon32 out, I could do that with a single command, but I'm unable to find it!

It might be that I'm mixing it up with some other old computer loading from tape though, I do have a bunch of systems... :)
Alastair
Posts: 669
Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2008 11:33 pm

Re: Autostart tape program?

Post by Alastair »

I am not aware of a single command that will explicitly load and execute a cassette based program but some (many?) commercial programs were written and saved in such a way that they autostarted when they were CLOADMed, perhaps it is those programs you are thinking of.
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snarkhunter
Posts: 241
Joined: Fri Apr 03, 2009 7:16 pm
Location: France

Re: Autostart tape program?

Post by snarkhunter »

This is most likely a case of autorun program. I seem to remember autorun was achieved by saving code to be loaded in the lower memory page (first 1024 KB of Dragon's memory), overriding the EXEC vector. I also think Dragon User once published some source code to achieve a similar result.

The only other command that may autostart a program is BOOT, but that only works on a disk system (and provided the disk was created as a bootable one).
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