Exorsim is missing the printer functions in my recent w7 cygwin compilation #4
Comments
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Thanks! I think I've implemented the printer functions from the disk controller firmware, but they just direct the output to the console. I need to add a command line option to allow you to instead save the output to a file, or direct it to a program (on UNIX/Linux, this would be the "lp" command to spool it to the printer or CUPS). Somewhere I have a filter to convert line printer output into postscript- I think this would help in a lot of cases. On Cygwin/Windows, I have no idea, I'll look into it. I'm hoping they have something like the UNIX "lp" command, but that connects to the normal Windows printer dialog or something. In the 80s, the Exorciser I used was connected to a GE chain-train printer- it was awesomely fast. I remember we also had a Motorola branded printer that nobody used, because it was terrible. It had no tractor feed and was very slow- I remember it used a shaft with a grove in it to move the print head back and forth, so that the head always traveled the entire paper width on each line. |
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I added an option "--lpt file". If you give it, any line printer output goes to the file. Also you can change the printer file while running by entering the monitor and using the "lpt file" command. |
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Great addition Joe Now we can use host's tools to make the printout behave in the printer as we wish |
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A thank you present |
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Thank you, this is awesome! I will definitely try it. I wonder how well M6800 Cobol sold.. I'm guessing not well :-) I'm forwarding EXORciser manuals and original system disks to Al Kossow at bitsavers.org (associated with the Computer History Museum), he has added some of my scans to the archive in the past (plus I rather they hold abandonware like this in case Motorola or NXP bothers about copyrights). I certainly appreciate any scanning and disk imaging work you do- you are probably one of the few people on earth who still has EXORciser manuals and disks. Please keep scanning and archiving :-) Well maybe there is more than I thought thanks to the Fairlight CMI, I've been reading all about your work. I presume you are recovering early Qasar source code? Is there a place where it's all going? |
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The recovery is mainly music: composer family floppy disk archives, but setting straight the history in the inventions in the CMI has become part of the work my colleagues, family and others want me to do. Still got lots of VERSAdos 68K family stuff, boards source code and even an EXORmacs. also and probably most manuals |
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I never saw an EXORmacs or the VERSAdos stuff- we moved on to using an IBM PC (a Tandy 1000 I think) for 6809 and 68000 development, I remember using the "2500 A.D." assembler for the 6809 in MS-DOS. It was a huge step up, symbols could be longer than 6 characters, and you could use lower case :-) I need to make a 6809 mode for exorsim someday, I think there is a 6809 MDOS boot disk on bitsavers. We only had 6800-based EXORcisers (complete with prom programmer board, emulator pod and EXORdisk-II), but we certainly used RASM09 a lot. I remember very long RLOAD runs. (I worked at a small company that made video titlers in the 80s- it started as a high school job) |
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Spent lots of time yesterday looking for EDOS updates to EDOS2 in my immediately accessible stuff, found nothing, next weekend will look in my storage unit elsewhere where i keep stuff i figured was of low probability of use. I probably have a floppy disk trail in all the disks i have but the contents of a lot of this is hard to tell because the writing on the labels has faded away. Need to read the disks and this requires each disk is treated first to dry and re-harden the magnetic film on it I'll probably have all the 6809 exorciser Roms and a 6809 MDOS. Someplace I have some 6809 simulator code that the games emulator people use and there were people using it to try and run the CMI 6809 code. Apparently the self modifying code, the program overlays and memory mapping dynamic changes gave them a tough nut to crack. Getting the real CMI sounds and the hardware artifacts in them is virtually impossible without the real CMI hardware. |
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treated first to dry and re-harden the magnetic film on it
I was wondering about this. Is there a known recipe for restoring
floppies? I found the worst thing is mold.
There is actually a listing for the 6809 version of EXBUG in the M6809
Exorciser user manual on bitsavers. I might type it in, only 3K..
Also someone uploaded the 6800 EXBUG-1.2 ROMs, so I've been playing with
them- they work, but I have to change the emulator to use them.. thinking
of a nice way to do this.
…On Tue, Jul 11, 2023 at 7:26 PM crestr1 ***@***.***> wrote:
Spent lots of time yesterday looking for EDOS updates to EDOS2 in my
immediately accessible stuff, found nothing, next weekend will look in my
storage unit elsewhere where i keep stuff i figured was of low probability
of use. I probably have a floppy disk trail in all the disks i have but the
contents of a lot of this is hard to tell because the writing on the labels
has faded away. Need to read the disks and this requires each disk is
treated first to dry and re-harden the magnetic film on it
I'll probably have all the 6809 exorciser Roms and a 6809 MDOS. Someplace
I have some 6809 simulator code that the games emulator people use and
there were people using it to try and run the CMI 6809 code. Apparently the
self modifying code, the program overlays and memory mapping dynamic
changes gave them a tough nut to crack. Getting the real CMI sounds and the
hardware artifacts in them is virtually impossible without the real CMI
hardware.
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ON RECOVERING DISKS: we have developed hardware and a work routine for recovering 8" floppies. It uses gutted drives and temperature controlled drying cabinet and a dust free stabilization area to get back to 22degC and safer surface hardness. we found there were no shortcuts if a disk is scratched, has mold, is in a warped jacket or seems to be dirty these conditions can cost you the recovery disk drive - the heads can become damaged, dirty beyond simple cleaning or misaligned at an angle to the tracking center (head pads twisted) there is no home remedy for almost certain recovery but a day hung drying in a 35deg C environment plus another day to stabilize and harden at 22 degC, helps a lot if the disks are not scratched and surfaces look pristine (slightly matt ) scratched disks need special cleaning to eliminate sticky spots that will do damage and from then on and cause the heads to scratch every disk later put in that drive. we often remove the magnetic media from disk jacket and put it into another jacket to recover data from it after cleaning the disk media itself |
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Hi Joe
posted some stuff on disk treatments we use to
help recovery of 8" floppies. This was a
real voyage of discovery over a few years that
ruined several disk drives. If you know
of any secondhand double sided 8" drives for sale let us know.
it looks like the code in the manual i sent you
was actually EDOS2 and the markings
on the pages was stuff i made during my putting
bits of this code into the M8 boot
load. A lot of the stuff i did in Canberra was
done in my Exorciser which i took there
need to look back at Exorciser disk stuff of that
day to find my toolchains for the M8
and figure out how it made M8 bootable images and the ROM code used.
Maybe i could be able to use the original M8 in
the powerhouse museum to get my boot
roms i think along the way the disk controller
was a PCB version that the first CMIs
used.
At 10:45 AM 12/07/2023, you wrote:
… >treated first to dry and re-harden the magnetic film on it
I was wondering about this. Is there a known recipe for restoring
floppies? I found the worst thing is mold.
There is actually a listing for the 6809 version of EXBUG in the M6809
Exorciser user manual on bitsavers. I might type it in, only 3K..
Also someone uploaded the 6800 EXBUG-1.2 ROMs, so I've been playing with
them- they work, but I have to change the emulator to use them.. thinking
of a nice way to do this.
On Tue, Jul 11, 2023 at 7:26�PM crestr1 ***@***.***> wrote:
> Spent lots of time yesterday looking for EDOS updates to EDOS2 in my
> immediately accessible stuff, found nothing, next weekend will look in my
> storage unit elsewhere where i keep stuff i figured was of low probability
> of use. I probably have a floppy disk trail
in all the disks i have but the
> contents of a lot of this is hard to tell
because the writing on the labels
> has faded away. Need to read the disks and this requires each disk is
> treated first to dry and re-harden the magnetic film on it
>
> I'll probably have all the 6809 exorciser Roms and a 6809 MDOS. Someplace
> I have some 6809 simulator code that the games emulator people use and
> there were people using it to try and run the
CMI 6809 code. Apparently the
> self modifying code, the program overlays and memory mapping dynamic
> changes gave them a tough nut to crack.
Getting the real CMI sounds and the
> hardware artifacts in them is virtually impossible without the real CMI
> hardware.
>
> �
> Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub
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I've got it- also I found that this guy in France wrote a closed-source EXORset emulator for Windows and has some EXORset images and documents: http://www.myithilien.com/crbst_11.html Also this site talks about it, has EXORset ROMs: https://www.retrotechnology.com/restore/exorset.html Immediately I can update "mdos" to support the EXORset mini-floppies. XDOS uses pretty much the same disk format as MDOS. |
Congratulation Joe on a truly remarkable and magnificent product.
It seems to have just one missing piece in my recent compilation: none of the printer directed stuff finds the printer in my system. Could be I've not setup Cygwin's linux properly.
the Exorciser printer firmware is partly on the exorciser disk controller pc board firmware and uses a printer controller card with a PIA on it.
When this is missing, printer directed functions go back to the console (eg DIR ;SEAL) or COPY XX.XX #LP or L=#LP)
If some more ROMS are needed I'll probably have them. I've still got and original working 1mz 6800 Exorciser which I bought new. I must say Exorsim is a lot faster and easier to use since I have no working Exorterm nowadays.
if this can be resolved it would be nice if it could address the form feeds issued by many Motorola software (eg the assemblers) so that modern printers obey the form feeds output from this motorola software and eject pages as directed.
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