HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: julian@bridge.welly.gen.nz (Julian Wright)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
Subject: Re: RISC-OS apps in modules
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 14:21:26 +1200
Reply-To: wright_j@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: USS Enterprise, NCC 1701a

idg10@cl.cam.ac.uk (I.D. Griffiths) writes:

> You're missing the fact that !Edit runs as a normal application and not a
> module application...  Although maybe it doesn't, it's hard to tell
> since I think the task manager only uses memory allocation to decide
> (i.e. 0k of app space means it's a module task...).  I don't know
> precisely what edit does, although it is quite likely to have some
> assembler patching...

It certainly appears to run as a module task which claims a chunk of
application space for workspace. It is started with the '*Desktop_Edit'
command, which you shouldn't use :-). Aside: It occurrs to me - since all
tasks must be started with a * command, why don't Acorn put a
'*RunModule <modulename>' command into the kernal, rather than each
module having to supply it's own '*Desktop_<name>' command? You would
still need the mechanism on startup of checking to see if you were
already running, etc, but this would eliminate a lot of superfluous
command tables being checked every time a * command is issued...

BTW There is a minor related bug with the Task Manager. Normally Pinboard
starts out being listed in the task manager as a module task, which is
fine. If you then load a backdrop into pinboard, the Task Manager moves
Pinboard into the application tasks area, as Pinboard is now using
application area. But now if you kill the backdrop Pinboard *stays* in
the application tasks area with a 0k wimpslot.

--
Confusious say: "Man who sit on hot stove is better off"
From: mhw@minster.york.ac.uk
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
Subject: RISCiX implementation
Date: 7 Oct 92 10:09:10 GMT
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of York, England

Does anyone know the details of how Acorn managed to get RISCiX to work?
(Apart from a couple of guys at Acorn who did the hacking!)

There seem to be a number of conflicts between the architecture of the
ARM and the assumptions that BSD makes about the machine it will run on.
For example:

* BSD prioritises interrupts and disables all interrupts below a certain
  priority to acheive mutual exclusion (using x=spltty(); ...; splx(x);).
  The ARM doesn't prioritise interrupts unless you start twiddling bits
  in the IOC's interrupt mask.

* BSD uses one stack (if I remember rightly); the kernel and interrupt
  handlers use the user mode stack to hold temporaries and such. The ARM
  gives the kernel, IRQ and FIQ handlers separate stack pointers
  which, while looking like a good idea, forces the kernel to allocate
  memory for two or more stacks rather than one.

* The kernel executes from virtual (i.e. logically mapped) memory. On ARM
  based machines this could be inefficient as the MEMC would have to be
  reprogrammed to page the interrupt handler in (for example) and it would
  seem more logical to place the kernel in the physical memory space.

* Is MEMC's operating system mode used? (The one that stops access to IO
  devices while leaving the processor in SVC mode.)

* 32k is a huge page size for a Unix system; what effect does this have on
  the size of executables and how does the vm system cope with it?

Anyone care to illuminate the grey areas?

-Mark.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Mark H. Wilkinson (mhw@minster.york.ac.uk)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
From: felixa@microsoft.com (Felix GTi Andrew)
Subject: Re: iconizing, modems, ro3 etc
Date: 15 Oct 92 19:31:06 GMT
Organization: Microsoft Corp.

Keywords: 

Applications with different names to their !<names> and iconisation.

There has been a discussion about minimising an app window and chaning the
iconised text to something other than the appname, but keep the ic_appname
for the sprite.

Its come to my attention that Acorn seem to call !Calc calculator - which
annoys the hell out of me as I cant find its sprite anyway from the name
calculator.

It seems that if you dont do anything with iconisation (ie ignore the messages)
then the text becomes the first word (if < 20 chars) of the title of the window.
W
Well actually it looks like its only 10 chars (minimise the configuration window
and you get Configurat)

Dont know if this will help anyone, but its annoying in the extreeme that
1) I have no documentation
2) I cant seem to get any
3) The stuff that I do get is wrong
4) There is no app similar to !Spy on the PC (no flames, its useful)
5) This may be a load of rubbish as I dont use Ro 3.1 so it may be fixed.

Frustraited.
	Felix

felixa@microsoft.com
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
From: burke@vxdesy.desy.de
Subject: Re: Help!!!!!!
Organization: (DESY, Hamburg, Germany)
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 14:26:38 GMT

In article <719177922.20896@minster.york.ac.uk>, wgt-a@minster.york.ac.uk writes:
> How can you call OS_Cli from assembler, and have errors passed back?

Don't call OS_Cli; it really isn't that useful from assembler except for very
simple cases (you waste time decoding the string). Just use the underlying OS
call directly.

e----><----p | Stephen Burke           | Internet: burke@vxdesy.desy.de
 H   H   1   | Gruppe FH1T (Liverpool) | DECnet:   vxdesy::burke (13313::burke)
 H   H  11   | DESY, Notkestrasse 85   | BITNET:   BURKE@DESYVAX or SB2@UKACRL
 HHHHH   1   | 2000 Hamburg 52         | JANET:    sb2@uk.ac.rl.ib
 H   H   1   | Germany                 | Phone:    + 49 40 8998 2282
 H   H 11111 | HERA, the world's largest electron microscope!
From: ainsjc@aisb.ed.ac.uk (Steffan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
Subject: Re: Real Icon Dragging.
Date: 7 Oct 92 13:47:01 GMT
Reply-To: ainsjc@aisb.ed.ac.uk (Steffan)
Organization: Dept AI, Edinburgh University, Scotland

In article <1992Oct7.161818.11278@waikato.ac.nz> bwc@waikato.ac.nz (Ug!) writes:
>Hi!  Could someone tell me what the FX call is to write the CMOS-RAM bit
>to turn the icon-dragging on?  (Assuming it still works in RiscOS 3.1)
>
>							Ug!

Me too.

Sorry, I would have saved bandwidth by asking the original poster to
forward information, but I can't post to New Zealand.

Steffan.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
From: kortink@cs.utwente.nl (John Kortink)
Subject: Redraws on palette changes ?
Organization: University of Twente, Dept. of Computer Science
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 12:13:27 GMT

ericl@cs.kuleuven.ac.be (Eric Lafortune) writes :

>John Tytgat writes :
>
>Does this mean that when a Wimp program changes a colour in a 16 colour
>mode using "VDU 19, <colour number>, 16, <red>, <green>, <blue>", the
>palette utility automatically issues a redraw of the screen ???
>
>I guess it has to mean something different because such a VDU 19,...
>sequence *does not* generate a redraw neither is there a broadcast
>message Message_PaletteChange (using Risc OS 2.0) being send.
>
>Is this a bug or do I misinterprete the PRMs ???

You misinterpret the PRM's. The WIMP does not know about palette changes
made with VDU 19. In a WIMP environment, Wimp_SetPalette should be used,
and this does have the effect described. Obviously the palette utility
uses Wimp_SetPalette.


John Kortink

Student of Informatics at the University of Twente, The Netherlands
(God, will I ever stop doing things 'on the side' and get it done?)
NETMAIL : kortink@cs.utwente.nl              DISCLAIMER : the usual
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
From: idg10@cl.cam.ac.uk (I.D. Griffiths)
Subject: Re: ADFS disk format (BBC Master)
Reply-To: idg10@cl.cam.ac.uk (I.D. Griffiths)
Organization: U of Cambridge, England
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 16:23:34 GMT

In article <1992Sep23.145723.23231@infodev.cam.ac.uk>,
amh15@cus.cam.ac.uk (A.M. Hart) writes:
|> 
|> 
|> HELP!
|> 
|> I need a small but vital piece of information about the BBC Master ADFS.
|> 
|> Does anyone out there know how the checksum at the end of each of the FS
|> map sectors (0 and 1 I think) is calculated?
Yup, had hours of fun with this a couple of years ago.  After
disassembling bits
of the ADFS, it transpires that the checksum is done by summing each byte into
the accumulator but not bothering to clear the carry, so each overflow adds one
to the total.  Clear carry before the first add.  I assume this was done
to make
it a few cycles faster....

Hope this helps.

Ian
From: bwc@waikato.ac.nz (Ug!)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
Subject: Warning!  Don't buy Risc Developments drive for A3000.
Date: 9 Oct 92 23:09:29 GMT
Organization: Vooniersity fo Kaiwato

Hi folks!

Well, after talking to several people who have been having the same hard drive
problems as myself, I can only suggest the following:

Do *not*, whatever you do, buy a Risc Developments internal 20 MByte drive for
the A3000 -- at least, until they update their firmware!  These problems are
common to all owners of this drive that I have met:

(a)  If you format the drive with a directory size of 256, you get the
     following problem:

-    when creating new files (not copying), if the file reaches some mysterious
     limit in size, the A3000 will freeze.  The pointer will stop being movable,
     the hourglass will stop moving, and control-break will not reset.

-    after this has happened, the file which you were part-way through creating
     will be undeleteable.  If you try to delete it, the machine will freeze
     again.  You *can* rename (including moving) and read the file.  You cannot
     write over the file.

-    this happens fairly commonly!  The only way to get rid of the files is to
     reformat the disc.

-    I suspect that the 'mysterious size' is when the length of the file
     exceeds the space in the free-size map where the file is put.

(b)  If you format the drive with a directory size of 512, you get the
     following problem:

-    files will mysteriously corrupt!  For instance, I copied ChangeFSI to the
     hard drive, and it stopped working.  I could still run it from the floppy.
     So, I deleted it, and tried again.  Still not working...

-    you cannot trust *anything* on the hard drive.  I have saved a file, then
     saved a copy to floppy, then exited the application and tried to load the
     version from the hard-drive.  Corrupt.

(c)  The only two sizes which you can use for directories when you format the
     drive are 256 and 512.

(d)  Both problems occur under RiscOS 2 *and* RiscOS 3.1.  The operating system
     is *not* the problem here.

So once again, do *not* buy these drives, util such time as the firmware on the
podules have been updated by Risc Developments.
								Ug!
From: nas20@cl.cam.ac.uk (Nick Smith)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
Subject: Re: Real Icon Dragging.
Date: 10 Oct 92 23:22:11 GMT
Reply-To: nas20@cl.cam.ac.uk (Nick Smith)
Organization: U of Cambridge Comp Lab, UK

In article <1992Oct7.182116.15067@cs.nott.ac.uk> smb@cs.nott.ac.uk (Simon Burrows) writes:
>In article <1992Oct7.134701.24557@aisb.ed.ac.uk> ainsjc@aisb.ed.ac.uk (Steffan) writes:
>>In article <1992Oct7.161818.11278@waikato.ac.nz> bwc@waikato.ac.nz (Ug!) writes:
>>>Hi!  Could someone tell me what the FX call is to write the CMOS-RAM bit
>>>to turn the icon-dragging on?  (Assuming it still works in RiscOS 3.1)
>
>The easiest way (although it is cheating somewhat) is to type
>*FX 162,28,3. This enables solid icon drags with shadows.
>
>Nick Smith has written a module to force all application file drags to
>use DragAsprite - it's on the Risc User magazine disc this month.
>
>Simon B.

Wow! Fame 8-) I wish I didn't have to admit to writing stuff for RU, but I'm
just a poor student who needs the money ... ;-)

A friend at Churchill (Paul Fidler - praf1@uk.ac.cam.phx) has updated ForceA
Drag to solid sprite drag from almost everything - for instance the filer 
windows ! It isn't 100% reliable, and doesn't run under RO3 currently - perhaps
others would be interested in hacking up somethinmg like this ? It looks so
cool, almost makes me want to go back to RO2 .... 

Nick.
(Only kidding about the RO2 !)
Sorry about the delay in posting this - the news poster thingy was broken ...

--
--
Nick Smith, Rm.226, Churchill College, Cambridge. ! Email: nas20@uk.ac.cam.phx
sig quote wanted - must be under guarantee.      ! Tel: (0223) 465596
From: enevill@acorn.co.uk (Edward Nevill)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
Subject: Re: problem with fprintf & DTC
Date: 7 Oct 92 10:52:56 GMT
Organization: Acorn Computers Ltd, Cambridge, England

> I'm having a problem with fprintf( using Desktop C
> when printf("%s\n",structure.feild); or printf(stdout,..) the program runs
> correctly
> but when fprintf(file_pointer,...) is used the program aborts with
> run time system error: malloc failed (or something damn close to it)

> this problem also occurrs with fputs(..file_pointer);

The problem is that when you first access a freshly opened stream, stdio
mallocs a buffer for it. If this malloc fails it reports a run time error.

There are a number of ways you can get around this.

1) Ensure your program has enough memory for the malloc to succeed.

2) Call setbuf or setvbuf immediately after opening the file

   setbuf(file_pointer, 0);         /* to turn file buffering off */

   static my_buff[BUFSIZ];          /* BUFSIZ is declared in stdio.h */
   setbuf(file_pointer, my_buff);

   static my_buff[SOME_OTHER_SIZE]; /* A size of your choosing */
   setvbuf(file_pointer, my_buff, _IOFBF, SOME_OTHER_SIZE);

Edward (enevill@acorn.co.uk)
From: gilbertd@p4.cs.man.ac.uk (David Alan Gilbert)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn.tech
Subject: Re: iconizing, modems, ro3 etc
Date: 13 Oct 92 07:34:16 GMT

In <memo.677982@cix.compulink.co.uk> plebeau@cix.compulink.co.uk (Paul Lebeau) writes:
>Unfortunately, there is no Arc software to drive fax modems, that
>I know of.  A colleague has written some simple code to drive our
>modem.  Is there any demand out there for us to develop this
>commercially?  How many of you have fax modems?

Dave Pilling sent me a little advert together with SparkFS
saying that they were aiming to have a fax program out around
now for cheap fax modems.

>Paul LeBeau

Dave Gilbert

(Going to show on Saturday)
-- 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
- David Alan Gilbert - gilbertd@p4.cs.man.ac.uk - G7FHJ@GB7NWP                -
------(Programmers don't sleep - they just park their heads)-------------------
From: julian@bridge.welly.gen.nz (Julian Wright)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: That alleged bug with RO 3.10
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 13:40:32 +1200
Reply-To: wright_j@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz
Organization: USS Enterprise, NCC 1701a

gaspar@urz.unibas.ch writes:

> 57xx dhrs in mode 0. I remember having 55xx dhrs under RISC OS 2.
> Now how do you explain this???

Faster C library.

--
Question Authority!   WHY?
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: modem-program
From: jwil1@cs.aukuni.ac.nz (TMOTA)
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 04:08:28 GMT
Organization: Computer Science Dept. University of Auckland

sdaveyj@cc.curtin.edu.au writes:

>heaps of features. (eg 115000 baud on A5000 multitasking downloading)
			^^^^^^
Isn't that a little fast for a serial port only officially capable of 9600 bps?
And modems capable of speeds in excess of 19200bps are a little scarce...

Or is this some dinky feature for transferring between 2 5000's via the
parallel ports?

Otherwise, it sounds interesting - maybe even worth posting to
  cba@acorn.co.nz  (The binaries submission address)
(hint hint ;-)
-- 
_________________  "I'd like to answer this question in two ways:
  /____ _ _/_ __       First in my normal voice, and then
 // / //_//_ /_/       in a silly, high-pitched whine." (Monty Python)
From: lithgow@usl.com (Malcolm Lithgow)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Friendly Exception Handling (Was: Re: That alleged bug with RO 3.10)
Date: 15 Oct 92 00:54:09 GMT

[In message "Re: Friendly Exception Handling (Was: Re: That alleged bug with RO 3.10)", Johnnie Walker writes:]
>Malcolm Lithgow (lithgow@usl.com) wrote:
>  
>: a) Make every effort to avoid them (did you know that Knuth is offering
>: a few hundred US dollars for every bug found in TeX82?)
>
>tEx IS a major error itself.

Well, on the article that mentioned the above fact, Knuth *did* mention
that there are those who say that everything about TeX is an error in
the first place. But he seemed unrepentant. ;-)

>Student of Idiocy at the university of Dortmund

Interesting sounding course -- is this the one politicians take? ;-)

-Malcolm.  lithgow@usl.com  These are merely my opinions -- don't get excited.
From: r_voisey@csd.uwe.ac.uk (R Voisey)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Heia guys: (ok, let's do it civilized...)
Date: 13 Oct 92 14:23:53 GMT
Organization: University of the West of England, Bristol

In article <1992Oct13.104321.1@cc.curtin.edu.au> sdaveyj@cc.curtin.edu.au writes:

>I aggree entirely. In my oppinion the only thing holding the Archimedes up now
>is RISC OS. In terms of performance it is not anazing any more. It is just
>a real USERS machine, very intuitive.

SHOCK HORROR!  Acorn have produced a machine for MERE END USERS!  How
could they do such a thing?

(The fact that the huge majority of Archimedes owners are not programmers
or hackers but 'just' users doesn't enter into it of course)..

I would also debate that the performance is no longer amazing.  I was
looking through some data sheets, and I was unable to find another
RISC chip that gives the same performance per pound (that's especially
true for ARM2 - and ARM250 is INCREDIBLE value for money, if only
sample quantities were readily available).

Bob


-- 
  Robert J. Voisey  :  r_voisey@csd.brispoly.ac.uk
         -- Probug Software Developments --
162 Staplehill Rd, Fishponds, Bristol, Avon, England
From: smb@cs.nott.ac.uk (Simon Burrows)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Hard Drive incompatibility under RISCOS 3.1, help!
Date: 7 Oct 92 13:43:37 GMT
Organization: Nottingham University

In article <1992Oct7.125616.24470@cs.nott.ac.uk> cep@cs.nott.ac.uk 
(Charlie Pearce) writes:
>Well, I have an A3000 with infernal (actually it's pretty good) IDE drive. I
>now have RISC OS 3.10, and although !Configure allows you to specify the 
>number of IDE discs, it doesn't recognise it, and it sits to the right of
>my Apps icon without multitasking verify etc. (ie. it's exactly the same as
>it was before because it uses the IDEFS on ROM rather than being an ADFS IDE 
>disc - does that make sense?) Is there anything I can do about it? There was
>something along the same lines in the Release Note about SCSI drives, but
>wasn't very helpful.

Ask your hard drive vendor for an update of the IDE software in EPROM.
They will probably charge you for the privilege!

Simon.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Simon Burrows  smb@cs.nott.ac.uk  Please say 'hello' at the BAU Show
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: MMBCorle@cen.ex.ac.uk (Martin Corley)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: 3D borders
Date: 15 Oct 92 17:11:21 GMT
Organization: University of Exeter, UK

In article <Bw615v.24o@brunel.ac.uk>, cs89jmb@brunel.ac.uk (Jason M Banham) writes:
> [...]
> Apparently, with RO3.10 you now have *ToolSprites which needs to be
> substituted for IconSprites in the original !SetIcons program.

> The benefit is better speed (though watch out for mis-matched sizes
> of sprites)

> Ta muchly

> Jayce.

Speaking of which, my brother just tidied up a rather nifty set of
3d-sprites I designed a while ago -- which have (wait for it) a
distinctly Acorn look and feel!  They work fine with 3.x, but only
exist for high-res colour modes -- I prefer dropping back to 2d when I
use "lesser" modes.  E-mail me if you want a look.
-- 
Martin Corley                                         ---------
University of Exeter                         M.M.B.Corley @ cen.ex.ac.uk
Exeter, UK                                            ---------
From: smiths@p4.cs.man.ac.uk (Little SteeeveS)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Some Quite Reliable Rumours I Heard
Summary: New Arm chip rumour
Keywords: ARM4 RUMOUR
Date: 15 Oct 92 12:49:23 GMT

I heard last night through a chain of sources originating in Acorn (I don't know how long or who) that next year there may be released an ARM4 (or whatever) hopefully compatible with our old machines (like ARM3 upgrades). This new ARM4 is said to be like the ARM250 and is said to include on the same chip:
ARM610 core
Floating Point Co-processor!!!!!
MEMC
IOC
VIDC ??? not sure.

Other rumours I've heard included talk of the VIDC2 having 24 bit for definite.

As to the reliabilty of these rumours, ask me not, but my source did know accurately the specs of the A3010 & A3020 2 months before they came out so judge as you will and please no flames about this.

Little SteeeveS

Disclaimer: The above views are mine and have nothing to do with any organization I may or may not be involved with etc etc.
From: lithgow@usl.com (Malcolm Lithgow)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Friendly Exception Handling (Was: Re: That alleged bug with RO 3.10)
Date: 12 Oct 92 01:52:48 GMT

Simon makes a very interesting point:

[In message "Re: That alleged bug with RO 3.10", Simon Burrows writes:]
>As far as the majority of users are concerned, killing the task manager is
>worse than a system crash, because most things still appear to work, but they
>do eventually end up having to reset the machine. In other words, it confuses
>the naive user, and they end up wondering whether they did the right thing.
>Many users wouldn't know what an Obey file is, let alone how to create one.
>
>[Discussion about ordinary users deleted.]

This is a very valid point. RISC OS is a fairly friendly system
usually, but if something goes wrong? The only part of RO that handles
exceptions neatly seems to be the filer, with its progress and error
and insert-disc dialogs.

But if you hit an error in a program, and I mean a real error -- what
happens? Generally the program says something cryptic and shuts down,
maybe allowing you to save your files, if you're lucky. In the worst
case the whole machine freezes.

It's particularly bad when the error occurs during start-up.

This behaviour is a problem common to all 'user-friendly' systems. The
Mac's horrible 'bomb dialog' used to drive me wild (it still would if I
used Mac's enough to get it much). The Amiga's 'Guru' thingy is
infuriating. Window's unhelpful errors are pathetic. And UNIX's sudden
cessation of activity is nerve wracking (SVR4.2). And I'm a
programmer!

As a programmer I find the Arch and UNIX better because they give you
better disaster control, but as a user they are all utterly pathetic!

I realize that these errors are poorly handled precisely because the programmer does not expect them to occur. But perhaps the programmer should:

a) Make every effort to avoid them (did you know that Knuth is offering
a few hundred US dollars for every bug found in TeX82?)

b) Make every effort to catch them gracefully and reassure the user by
leading them through whatever actions are necessary.

Isn't it rather silly that TEX82, a *free* program, should be more
reliable and correct than a program that costs, say US$300 per copy
(take your choice of program)?

Is anyone doing anything about this sort of problem in their app's?

-Malcolm.  lithgow@usl.com  These are merely my opinions.