HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: hucaby@mri.uky.edu (David Hucaby)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.transputer
Subject: Re: TEXAS INSTRUMENTS' Electronic Mail message # 198017
Date: 18 Aug 92 19:32:04 GMT
Organization: Univ. of Ky MRI Center

In article <22920818175022.0004006329D40X4@mcimail.com>, 
(Mitchell Reifel) writes:
|> -----------------------------
|>  
|> Also, the number of "third party" vendors who have included C40 support with
|> their Transputer support (3L, Perihelion, etc.) numbers over two dozen. Since
|> these companies position their products where the revenue is, it is a good
|> market indicator for the C40.
|>  
|> (stuff deleted)
|>
|> Regards,
|> Mitch Reifel
|> TMS320C40 Program Manager
|> Texas Instruments, Houston, Texas
|> 5140840@mcimail.com
|>  
|>  

Is there a list of current vendors who are offering support (hardware
and software) for the C40? I've been trying to follow what's available
for it since it was first announced, but haven't seen that much 
advertising done. 

I have a new (Transtech) transputer-based system here, 
and would like to think about mixing in C40's in the future. 
However, I don't know how various vendors are making this feasible. 
Does TI have any info on its third-party supporters that would be mailable,
or should one contact individual vendors first?

      =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
David Hucaby       hucaby@mri.uky.edu   | "There is no finer thing a machine 
                                        |    can do than to give his last 
Univ. of Kentucky MRI Center            |    transistor for his friends or 
106 MRI Building, 800 Rose Street       |              township."
Lexington, Kentucky 40536-0098          | 
(606) 258-4307     Fax: (606) 258-1068  |  Don Knotts in "How to Frame a Figg"
From: michael@gandalf.moria (Michael Haardt)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.transputer
Subject: Re: Wanted: Cross-Assembler
Date: 17 Aug 92 23:42:18 GMT
Reply-To: u31b3hs@pool.informatik.rwth-aachen.de (Michael Haardt)
Organization: Moria

In article <920814872@gandalf.moria>, michael@gandalf.moria (Michael Haardt) writes:
> In article <1992Aug12.180029.1143@gdr.bath.ac.uk>, mapsajw@gdr.bath.ac.uk (S A J Winder) writes:
>> Can anyone point me to an ftp-able cross-assembler to generate T400/T800
>> object code on the PC? I need the assembler to be stand alone software,
>> unlike the TDS.
> 
> I am working on such a thing and still looking for beta testers.  It is
> an assembler and linker, the linker creating code to start at a specific
> address.  A small disassembler is included.  I use m4 as macroprocessor.
> The assembler doesn't understand floating point constants yet.  It may
> still contain bugs, so you are warned...
> 
> The whole thing is written in ANSI C and should be quite portable.

Some people asked for more information about it.  I will make the beta
version available as source code under the condition that you don't use
it for commercial use, which needs a written license.  All rights are 
reserved.  I will post further information where you can get it after I
make it available, which will be in a few days.

I will accept and implement patches which make it *more* POSIX, not
less, so forget about #ifdef MY_WEIRD_UNIX.  In my opinion, a system 
requiring such things should be patched, not the application :)

Oh, and of course I used Origami for writing it, so if you want to edit 
something, you better use Origami or TDS too.  All source codes together
are about 60k.  Short manual pages are provided.  The mnemonics aren't, 
I assume that you have Inmos "Compiler writer's guide" to look them up.
The assembler can produce warnings for instructions which are undefined 
to the selected chip: t400, t414, t425 and t800.

The loader output is a binary which should be loaded at a specific address,
you can directly boot your transputer with it.  Library support isn't 
provided yet.

I use my own object format for object modules, and any flames will be 
bounced.  

The assembler is dumb, because I use m4 as macro processor.  It knows
about public and file-private symbols, expressions of them, it knows
equ, db, dw and align.  Expressions can use symbols of any other module.
No segments (yet), no macros, no floating point constants, of course no 
floating point expressions too.  A line of source code contains either 
one comment, one mnemonic or one label.

The whole thing is finished, which means that it produces a few test 
binaries for me.  They are small, I haven't learnt the whole assember
language of transputers yet.  The longest one is a memory check program,
being 728 bytes long.

I use iserver for most programs, a binary for Linux and a b004 will be 
available next time.

Michael
Newsgroups: comp.sys.transputer
From: scm@aiware.in-berlin.de (Harald Schmidt)
Subject: How many Transputers are enough?
Keywords: t800
Organization: AIware
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 10:28:14 GMT

Hallihallo,

does anybody know the max. number of transputers I can connect,
and the resulting MIPS/MFLOPS.
What is the best price/power-ratio?

Thanks for any infomation,

	Harald
-- 
User:		Harald Schmidt
E-Mail:		scm@aiware.in-berlin.de
Voice:		Berlin - 815 59 75
Data:		Berlin - 815 75 90 (nuucp/nuucp)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: new PC's, what's happening acorn?
From: jwil1@cs.aukuni.ac.nz (TMOTA)
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 00:53:14 GMT
Organization: Computer Science Dept. University of Auckland

t-piersh@microsoft.com (Piers Haken) writes:

>that future versions will be easier to use. What I was really getting
>at was the complete lack of marketing that Acorn seem to have. Take
>a look at a typical PC magazine and you'll find ads from Mirosoft, IBM, Apple,
>Compaq, Borland - everybody, but you'll be hard pushed to find an Acorn

Well, yes. I expect that companies 100 times the size of Acorn could
afford adverts a bit more easily than Acorn can. Also, a lot of big companies
in the PC world ALLL make 386 and 486 based PCs, so there is a higher level
of competition within the PC magazines than we find in Acorn ones.

>advert in an Acorn-based magazine (let alone a PC one). You could say that

Well, maybe Acorn have realised that there is no point in preaching to the
converted? Who do you think is going to read Acorn User?

>they don't need to advertise, since they're the only guys that make the
>machines, but take a look at Apple and their recent attack on the usability
>of Windows.

If Acorn had the capital, then they would probably be best to advertise in
PC magazines - with the new rumored 'games machine' it might even be possible
to think about advertising in Amiga/ST magazines.
But think about it - you look through 200 pages of PC compatible products, and
then here's this one page of this comparable machine which is totally
incompatible with what you are obviously looking for: It'd have to be a damn
good advert to make you think of investigating further.

Acorn's market lies primarily in education, and I think they do a reasonable
job of advertising in this area (though I have had little experience of their
work in this area). The second set of users that buy Acorn goods are us, the
people who have used Acorn gear, and have realised that it's "better" for
us. Convincing the rest of the world will take more than just a couple of
glossy adverts in the back of a PC rag, and Acorn just don't have the
financial clout to try this...

Though I do agree, Acorn do need to improve their marketing: It has been getting
a *lot* better recently, but it needs to continue to get better...

-- 
_________________  "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: adamd@rhi.hi.is (Adam David)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: LPMud gamedriver for 3.0 mudlib
Date: 18 Aug 92 19:37:47 GMT

m_sattle@tangram.informatik.uni-kl.de (Matthias Sattler) writes:

>I need the LPMud gamedriver for Archimedes compiled in 3.0 mode to run our
>new alpha-test 3.0 mudlib....
>Our old 2.4.5 mudlib works fine with your gamedriver compiles in compat mode.

I am working on a port of 3.1.2.f LPmud gamedriver (Amylaar's version) to the
Archimedes. The main delay factor is the user interface and emulating sockets
in an efficient and natural manner.

The main differences in the new version (expect it in september, sorry for the
delays) are:

general bug-fixes.
new efuns.
(hopefully) a new frontend that can give you more than one login at a time.
ability to compile in native mode.

Main gripes are:

stupid filename and directory limits (courtesy of Acorn and friends).
task windows that still crash (though less often in newer versions).

I will post an announcement when the new version is ready for preliminary
release. If anyone wants to discuss the details with me for coding the user
client interface, or contribute some help / code for this part, email me and
we'll sort it out. That would speed things up quite a bit. After spending a
weekend trying to do something useful with menus in C with RiscOSlib, I
realised I have better things to do with my time and energies than getting
RiscOSlib to work (that thing needs rewriting or replacing). This program will
be freely available by ftp when it is ready.

--
Adam David. (adamd@rhi.hi.is)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Word Hound version 1.10
From: jwil1@cs.aukuni.ac.nz (TMOTA)
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 20:48:31 GMT
 <1992Aug11.115304.20461@doc.ic.ac.uk> <2A2n4Xj017n@bridge.welly.gen.nz>
Organization: Computer Science Dept. University of Auckland

julian@bridge.welly.gen.nz (Julian Wright) writes:

>ijp@doc.ic.ac.uk (Ian Palmer) writes:

>Yes paths are available in that form under RISC OS 2, but only for
>loading/reading from that path. If you tried to write/save to a path
>your file instead gets placed in the CSD. Under RISC OS 3 this has
>been corrected so that saving to a path will cause the file to be saved
>with the first element of the path for which a save operation is possible.

This is good - it gives a good solution to those people who were earlier
complaining about 77 files/directory limits.
-- 
_________________  "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: ph10@cus.cam.ac.uk (Philip Hazel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: So, should I buy an A540 now or wait for what's behind door #1?
Date: 13 Aug 92 07:45:26 GMT
Distribution: comp
Organization: University of Cambridge Computing Service

In article <1992Aug12.144413.22738@rdg.dec.com>, goodwin@edieng.enet.dec.com (Pete Goodwin) writes:
|> Well, if any new machines appear, they'll probably appear at the Acorn User
|> show in October, which is two months away. The A540 is currently top of the
|> range, but doesn't have RISC-OS 3, as the A5000's do.

But Acorn has promised RISC OS 3 for other machines "soon", and the AU Show
might just be the place for that too...

--
Internet: P.Hazel@ucs.cam.ac.uk       University Computing Service,
JANET:    P.Hazel@uk.ac.cam.ucs       Computer Laboratory, Pembroke St,
Phone:    +44 223 334714              Cambridge CB2 3QG, England.
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
From: pmoore@cix.compulink.co.uk (Paul Moore)
Subject: Re: Problem with RCS utility
Reply-To: pmoore@cix.compulink.co.uk
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1992 10:41:21 +0000

You need the OS variable Temp$Dir set to the full pathname of a directory 
into which RCS can put temporary files - eg
 
*SET Temp$Dir adfs::HardDisc4.$.Temp
 
If you have the recent !Scrap application, you could
 
*SET Temp$Dir <Wimp$ScrapDir>
 
Gustav.
 
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul Moore (pmoore@cix.compulink.co.uk)   |
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Programming is the process of debugging an empty source file
------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: neilp@cs.hw.ac.uk (Neil Postlethwaite)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: new PC's, what's happening acorn?
Date: 14 Aug 92 10:49:29 GMT
Organization: Dept of Computer Science, Heriot-Watt University, Scotland

In article <9208120143.AA29852@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> lithgow@upjomon.usl.com (Malcolm Lithgow) writes:
>
>If Acorn released an expensive, new machine now, no-one would buy it, and
>it would be 'out of date' by the time people got enough money to buy the
>thing. If Acorn releases minor improvements to their current range, and
>quietly works on their new mega-machine until the recession breaks (in a
>year or two?) then they'll have much more success. Of course, if the
>recession never breaks, Acorn are in deep trouble (but who isn't?).
>

Depends on the market place.

Despite what Ashley says, if Acorn were to launch a high end machine
(has to be unix based or no-one will buy it : the A540 hasn't been a hot
cakes seller has it !) the competition will be Sun, HP and DEC in the
Unix workstation market, NOT Ferrari.

Even despite the recession Sun are doing pretty good are they not ???

Neil

P.S. A cheap Unix box based on an 8Mb/200Mb/monitor A5000 at under 2 grand
     would be *popular* !!!
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
From: rhorne@cix.compulink.co.uk (Roger Horne)
Subject: Re: impression->TEX
Reply-To: rhorne@cix.compulink.co.uk
Date: Sat, 15 Aug 1992 12:25:01 +0000

Stephen Burke asks---
 
 
  > This is an interesting question - are PostScript fonts
  > available for TeX? (i.e. as TFM files). There's no reason
  > why they shouldn't be, but I've never seen any. 
 
The Kinch Computer Company markets "TeX-compatible Bit-Mapped Fonts 
Identical to Adobe Postscript Typefaces".
 
In comp.text.tex today someone refers to psfonts.tar which apparently
contains the pk fonts (but not the tfm s).

And there are two programs, ps2pk and ps2mf which claim to convert type 1 to 
pk format and metafont source respectively. I have managed to get both of 
them working but neither is really satisfactory.
 
Roger Horne
7 New Square
Lincoln's Inn
London WC2A 3QS
rhorne@cix.compulink.co.uk
From: imb@harvey (Ian Brown)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Problem with RCS utility
Date: 21 Aug 92 08:48:50 GMT
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL3

I have just put the first distributution of RCS onto my machine.
The initial check in's worked fine as did the the check out.
BUT there is a problem when checking in any alterations, diff complains
that it requies two files. Looking at the source (1hour), has not been
very helpful other that to suggest that a NULL string (or pointer), is
causing the problem.
I did have a thought about tempory file, where are they created, the
documentaion mentions that mktemp() creates them under temp_dir.

Can any one help...
The code seems to use Temp$Dir, is this needed, what is it's format...


	All the best
              Ian Malcolm Brown

Mail:         imb@oasis.icl.co.uk  OR  ...!uel!dsbc!imb
Phone:        +44 344 424842 x2310 (ITD 7263 2310)
Fax:          +44 344 487832
Organization: International Computers Limited
Address:      ICL, Lovelace Road, Bracknell, Berkshire, RG12 8SN, UK
From: neilp@cs.hw.ac.uk (Neil Postlethwaite)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Acorn and Psion join forces......
Date: 18 Aug 92 09:25:22 GMT
Organization: Dept of Computer Science, Heriot-Watt University, Scotland

In article <l8msc4INNq3j@cronkite> andyf@yama.uk.sun.com writes:
>
>Hi All,
>	
>	Yesterday (13/8) Acorn held a meeting in a Park Lane hotel in London for
>	dealers.
>
>	At this meeting they are reputed to have announced SIX new products......
>
>	I have yet to discover all the details as the dealers are bound by a 
>	non-disclosure agreement of some sort, but it does seem certain that 
>	Acorn have joined forces with Psion to produce a hand-held 'computer'
>	to retail at about 250 pounds.

	Maybe they should buy the rights and call it the Active Book ??


	Neil

P.S. Is EO/Active Book dead yet ??? Roll on The Apple Newton !!
From: r_voisey@csd.brispoly.ac.uk (R Voisey)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Why isn't everything PD ?y
Date: 18 Aug 92 22:53:16 GMT
Organization: Bristol Polytechnic, England

In article <1992Aug18.095919.10153@waikato.ac.nz> mcg@waikato.ac.nz writes:

>A, B, C are the cost of making the software for a company, whereas the only 
>expense incurred by, say John, is the electricity/coffee used in making the 
>prog.
>
> He neither incurrs the expense of supplying a disc or return postage (maybe 
>e-mail costs, but they are negligable), so the fee he sets is basically 
>, (excuse the pun) *pure* profit.

An applications programmer might earn in the region of 20+ quid an hour..
how many hours do you suppose John has taken to write Translator?  Quite a
few hundred I suspect..  in this time I don't doubt that John has the
talent to have written something for the commercial market - a graphics
translation utility for example.

Just because John's net profit is almost equal to his gross profit doesn't
imply that he's ripping people off - it just implies that he's theoretically
onto a good thing.  Of course he's not, because too many people share your
views.

Bob
-- 
Robert J. Voisey  :  r_voisey@csd.brispoly.ac.uk   (Janet)
GUI coders do it     Bob Voisey @ 2:252/106.0      (Fidonet)
on the desktop       Bob Voisey @ 100:104/106.0    (TurboNet)
From: J.W.Harley@newcastle.ac.uk (Jon Harley)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Acorn User Show get-together
Date: 5 Aug 92 09:42:30 GMT
Organization: University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK, NE1 7RU

Robert.Turner@brunel.ac.uk (Robert Turner) writes:
>dbh@doc.ic.ac.uk (Denis Howe) writes:=
>%How about arranging a time and place to gather to say hello?  It would
>%be nice to put faces to the names.
>
>YES!!!!!   How about the Saturday, unfortunately some of us have to
>work! (ok, show our faces occasionally, but what's the difference).
>
>Who is likely to be there on Saturday from Acorn (Owen, will you bring
>your Tuba (or whatever????))!

Yes, I'd vote for the Saturday - and make it the afternoon, some of us
live a long way from London you know!


/jon
PS - hi to those who remember me, I haven't posted in this group for ages.
   ___________________ ____ ________________________________________
  / -- Jonathan Harley \  /_     One of the "merry scurrying       //    //  //
 / J.W.Harley@ncl.ac.uk \/ /     pixy folk"  (--John Fisher)      // // //////
/_Phone:UK 091 222 8504__\/__[B2t+w-g+svrp]___________________///////////  //
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
From: u894776@bruny.cc.utas.edu.au (James McCoull)
Subject: Re: New machines from Acorn.
Organization: University of Tasmania, Australia.
Date: Thu, 13 Aug 1992 07:09:28 GMT

andyf@yama.uk.sun.com (Andrew Fox - Sun UK - Answer centre) writes:

	[Describes new arc:
>	Specifications for A1000
>	========================
>	12Mhz ARM2 CPU (running at approx 7 MIPS)
	^ [wheee! my polygon routine will be almost twice as fast :)]
>	2Mb 12 Mhz ram (upgradeable to 4Mb)
>	1.6Mb Floppy drive
>	RISC OS 3.10
>	Two 9-pin D standard joystick ports
>	RCA outputs for stereo sound
>	Optional 40 or 80 Mb IDE internal hard drive.
>	Plus all the usual ports found on the A3000.
>	The price has been set at around 400 pounds.

I hope something like this really is in the pipeline.
I'm leaving university soon, and looking to get into microcomputer software
development - and the more lower end arc's sold, the more likely I am
[and more importantly the *real* developers]
to head towards the archimedes.  A machine like this is definitely a step
in the right direction. (If only VIDC had 256 palette registers instead
of 16 ;-) - it would be perfect of VGA 320x200x256 conversions! )

Anyway... hopefully these machines will be out soon!  'cos the third
wave of home micros will be hitting soon - Atari Falcon (vapour?), AA Amigas
and now hopefully this new low cost arc.
[First wave = bbc, c64, spectrum, Second wave = amiga, atarist]

If a machine like this *really* is on the way, then i must commend
the marketing [research] branch of Acorn  - It looks like you have finally
got it right!
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Acorn pushes out small dealers
From: Pat Cain <patrick@sideways.welly.gen.nz>
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1992 23:54:10 GMT
Organization: Sideways Bulletin Board, Lower Hutt, New Zealand

bcockburn@acorn.co.uk (Bruce Cockburn) in <17981@acorn.co.uk> writes:
> 
>   Who would be happy with a dealer who didn't have a good range of third
> party stuff?  Who would be happy if, when they rang up for technical suport,
> they were told "we have to get back to you on that" or "sorry our technical
> person is off on two weeks holiday, my advice is don't switch the computer
> on again 'till they get back"?

But usually it's the bigger department stores who are the ones who DON'T
have the technical staff.  Whitcoulls in NZ is a good example of that
these days.  The small places are usually run by people who are selling
the machines because they know and like them.

I don't think you're going to get better dealers by cutting out the
smaller ones, just a higher percentage of ones who don't know much about
the machines... for them it's just another computer that doesn't sell as
well as the Amiga or PC.

Sure, the smaller dealers can't afford to have a large stock, but (in NZ
at least) the smaller dealers seem to have a good selection of quality
software whereas the bigger dealers tend to get anything that's listed
in the catalogue.
From: gta@st-andrews.ac.uk (Graham Allan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: New PC's, what's happening acorn?
Date: 17 Aug 92 04:15:42 GMT
Reply-To: gta@st-andrews.ac.uk
Organization: Greyfriars mail-relay

s047@SAND.SICS.BU.OZ.AU (Jeremy Lee) writes:

> Also, adhering to that wonderfull american ideology that we all know and
> love, they have thrown even more into Windows proper than was ever
> necessary. They now have, wait for it, a screensaver built into the
> desktop controls. Why?!?! It's useless. It provides three screensaver
> options, each of which are very dull. It also ignores that fact that
> After Dark has just been released for Windows, and there has been a
> reasonable PD screensaver called "ScreenPeace" available for one and a
> half years!! There are other examples, but hardwiring a weak, useless
> screensaver into what is basically the operating system just seems
> insanely stupid.

Actually, although I dislike Windows in other (most) respects, I think this
one point is a little unfair. It depends entirely on your philosophy for a
screensaver (if such a petty thing could be said to have a 'philosophy'!!).
If you want something entertaining, fine, use After Dark. The one built into
Windows (like the one in RISC OS 3) fulfils other criteria: (1) a screen
saver is arguably useful for the health of the monitor (2) other than that,
it isn't very important so should take mimimum memory or CPU time from other
tasks. This is the approach I would agree with; if it blanks the screen
successfully and runs in about 2K of RAM, that's good enough.

Graham
From: D.S.Walker@bradford.ac.uk (Simeon Walker)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.acorn
Subject: Re: Help My Disc Drive is dying!!
Date: 20 Aug 92 13:07:30 GMT
Organization: University of Bradford, UK
Originator: 91909178@occam

In article <5815@m1.cs.man.ac.uk> sks@fiveg.icl.co.uk (Steve Smith) writes:
>I keep getting Disc Error 08 on my old A310 floppy drive.
>I think the top head is worn out.
>I've tried cleaning the heads with I.P.Alcohol but it doesn't help.
>Anyone know where I can get a new drive?? Cheap? Repair? Second hand?
>Preferably one that fits in the A310?
>
 I went to a computer fair a couple of weeks ago, it's one that travels
around the country, I think it advertises in Micro Mart.

 There was at least one stall there which was selling 720k 3.5" drives
for just 9 pounds. I guess nobody wants them anymore, for PC's anyway.
You should have no problem replacing the one in your Arc.

>ta
>SteeveS


-- 
Sim. ----------------------------------------------------------- Simeon Walker,
----------------------------------------- Department of Electrical Engineering,
D.S.Walker@bradford.ac.uk -------------------- University of Bradford, England.