33 replies to this topic

[Roeoender]

Yesterday I found really BIG thing for CASIO-
whlie searching for smthing through usenet (@ google) I found
a note about a program perfect for out calc, it is
CTLoad.com (only 3 kb) which
*** Loads device driver (.SYS) from the command line ***
I quickly executed it with RAMDRIVE.SYS from WIN98/COMMAND/EBD
directory and WHOA it works! (RAMDRIVE.SYS from DOS 6.22 is better
because it is smaller).
So it is possible to create files right on the calc (even directories - by using COMMAND.COM from DATALIGHT's ROM-DOS).
Imagine creating programs right on the calc! (probably asm86 will work fine).
Right now I am disassembling DOS6.22's RAMDRIVE.SYS to force it to create this RAM drive in a BASIC file (at least at the first possible BASIC proram address) - this will avoid eating memory by the RAM disk.

In the free time I will create a .ZIP package with all those goodies, but right now you can search the web for ctload.

Roeoender.

[BiTwhise]

kewl

[Killer83Z]

Hooray for roeoeoeoeoeoeoender! Keep going!

[2072]

There is a special place in the RAM of the calc where is written the first free memory address after basic file you should read there it will prevent from erazing the user's area or even inspire of my great memzone library.

[Casto Productions]

if asm could be written right on the calc, wouldn't that lead to a LOT of calc crashes, in which the data the person was just programing would be lost? Or am I not understanding this right?

[Roeoender]

OK, after many hours of research I finnaly had to write a RAMDISK driver by myself. It now seems to work properly, it is right now fixed 128Kb size and starts from 1D00:0000 address, has no error checking and is 392 bytes (!) long. It is everything what I need right now, but probably for other users I should add "intelligent" finding where in the memory to install the drive and what size it should have (resolution 512 bytes). I also have to work on the source code (as all my ASM code it will be released).
But right now I actually would like to play with it.

to 2072:
There is one drawback to this method - what if the user creates another file - the end of used CALC's cpace will change - so RAMDISK would be overwritten. I will think what to do. Right now I simply don't use BASIC :-).

to Casto Productions:
your question is like this situation:
Somebody invented the first car, he announced it and in reply he heard that cars are dangerous because you can die driving them.
Ofcourse - if you don't know how to use a tool don't use it.

Anyway RAMDISK has many other purposes than only doing assembly.
There are a lot of tine DOS programs found on the net (text editors for example) that need a DISK that can be read and written to.
You can even find a BASIC interpreter that read source code from disk and creates a binary file.


Lots of ideas, not so much time to do it...

Roeoender.

[2072]

to 2072:
There is one drawback  to this method - what if the user creates another file - the end of used CALC's cpace will change - so RAMDISK would be overwritten. I will think what to do. Right now I simply don't use BASIC :-).

Well you are right so the only solution is that when the user creates a new basic file or whatever he wants the calc moves your ramdisk...

Note: With my library you don't have to use basic files... (it's called "memzone") and when a "zone" is used the calc cannot write on it.

[ross8653]

i'm guessing now someone will try to install <{GNULINUX}> on it, and maybe sodder in another 64mb of EDO

[superna]

hey roe, stop now
just use these routines
its ridiculous
i want to use basic some times, i'm still at school
and the system can take care of your drive, just do it

[Roeoender]

to 2072:
CASIO's system won't overwrite a memzone (or rather MCS as CASIO calls it), but it will move it, and my RAMdisk device drive has to be informed about it (somehow), which will sadly make device driver bigger (I think that DOS allocates RAM for programs in chunks of about 512 or 1024 bytes, so I have about 100 bytes or 600 bytes more).

Now in reply to ross:
My friends at school often suggest it, it seems to be a bit hard, but in the future who knows...
Anyway all <{GNULINUX}> (mostly C) sources are available so there shouldn't be a problem of porting some text baesd programs.
But even now it looks funny when I run Datalight's command.com and use dos programs :debug,editln,mem,and so on, just like on the PC.

to Superna:
I don't understand your post.
What is ridiculous?
I don't prohibit you using basic (I don't prohibit you to do anything )
but as for me I am using basic just to store data from ASM/C programs, so it is logical to me that I want to do it in more "cultural" way (ofcourse 2072's method is "cultural" too)
>> System can take care of my drive
huh?
>> just do it
I did it

Roeoender

[Roeoender]

Ok, so here it is 128Kb RamDisk, you can find it in
This File
For experienced users only.

--EDIT--
To people at French Forum:
Gosh... I looked at the french forum and found that there is a thread "CAZIO ELEKTRONICS 2" this is something about a new clock - it uses my program's name but I haven't made it! I would someone at French forum to inform the author to change his program's name - simply because I already have new version of CAZIO Electronic's clock and his ver 2.0 (or sometimes stated as 1.0) as he calls it will collide with my version coding. Thanks.

Roeoender.

[huhn_m]

You misstyped the filename of the driver in the readme.txt in step
installation. It has to be rd.sys not rb.sys.

Have you got a list of commands for the dos? It seems as if MD
doesn't work and I can't call it with a /? parameter.

What about replacing some F keys with the functions

-backspace
-questionmark
-(minus -)

This would help a lot!

Bye huhn

[Roeoender]

To create a directory you probably need to use more complex command.com
than this located on drive A:, for me ROM DOS from DEMO -DISK from the datalight page works just fine and is a lot more talkative than the miniCMD.
For DOS commands download MS-DOS6.22 disk images, there is help.com (or exe) which explains all commands. You can also look into command.com and at the end of the file you will find the list.
As for new keyset - it is very easy to change the layout - just look into the .asm source file. The winter-break is over for me so I won't have time to improve it (moreover it needs some "intelligent" planning of keys layout).
Roeoender.

[Maitre Kiwi]

I don't understant, when i execute ctload, calc say : not enough memory.

After complet restet [no programs], i install strict necessary and your program, and i have the same problem, what is it ???

[Roeoender]

This is really strange, because I have AFX ROM version 1.01 which is said to have the smallest amount of System memory. If you were running it through Command.com then try using some file explorer (like my Linl), because executing command.com (this from drive A) eats about 5 Kb of RAM.

Anyway all resident part of CTLOAD+RD.sys use less than 2 Kb (and while running they use less than 5 Kb).

Oh and make sure that you are running ctload.com not exe (exe is the original package from Creative labs)

One again about CAZIO Elektronics:
Now I am really angry. I have run this program on my calc and now I see why it uses my program's name. My work has been copied and claimed to be someone's elses work. I haven't received any mail asking me to use my idea, graphics and so on.
This strenghtened my will of not giving the source code of my programs.
Anyway I sooner or later I will see French RamDisk and Enter (sadly I released ASM codes).
Gosh... does people really have no idea for new and *original* programs for CASIO? I can give some.
Roeoender

[Killer83Z]

Now that's really fucked up. Have you contacted the author about this?

[Maitre Kiwi]

mea culpa, scuse me, I didn't know that I must decompress archive !!




so, thanks !

[2072]

Now that's really fucked up. Have you contacted the author about this?

I posted a message in the concerned topic.

[huhn_m]

@roeoender

There is no posibility to run the command.com of datalight! It seems that there
is to few memory. Is it possible that this is caused because I use TOUCHE to
start LINL then start the Enter.com and then again TOUCHE -> LINL -> A:\command.com ?

I rewrote the MD command in assembler and it worked fine on the computer,
But if I execute it on the calc there is no directory created and the cd command
shows an 'Invalid directory' Message.

Is it possible the you at first have to format the ramdisk on a FAT16 Format??
Maybe the current format doesn't support directorys??

[huhn_m]

I found an editor call e.com Its pretty small (6,5 KB) and contains the asm
sources. I don't know egnough to reconfigure it for the use with the calc
but if anyone thinks he/she can do it send me a PM and I'll mail the sources
to your e-mail adresse.

[X-thunder28]

Good !
Ramdrive is static, or it is deleted when AFX reboot ? ( sorry for my english )

[huhn_m]

If you reboot the AFX the ramdrive seems to be deleted.

[Maitre Kiwi]

It's normal, when you reboot calc, memory will be cleared ! ^^ like on pc !

I thinks a progs who can write on flash will be good for no problems !

[huhn_m]

Yeah! That yould be good! no programs would ever be deleted!

@ALL:
Look at the site of Whyp! There was an explanation how to
write to the flash, but I don't understand french this well. If you do then
please try it out and write a program to backup the ramdisk to a flash!

This would be great! No more dataloose if you've to reboot the calc.

@ROEOENDER:
My files on drive A seem to be hidden somtimes after I installed enter.com!
I cant see them! neither with linl nor with Sysexpl! Is there any possibility to
run the command.com? I've ROM version 1.03

[Maitre Kiwi]

No, i don't think to a program who write on flash

but a drivers like rd.sys who give a special acces to this

casio have already one, but what you have see he doesn't give full access

[Roeoender]

OK, lots of topics...
*) About low mem (huhn_m's subject):
I don't know about other programs, but my linl (probably SysExpl does it the same) uses execv function to run a program, this function removes (or rather overwrites) the parent process (linl), so executing 2000 times linl won't eat your memory.
With command.com it is different (at least without /p option) becaues this sets up a new shell inside the current shell (note that you can exit to the "parent" shell with EXIT command), so running command.com few times *will* eat memory.


*) About directories:
As I said earlier you cannot make directory with the standard (this located on drive A:) command.com, you have to upload to the calc a more advanced command.com (but still a 6.22 version) I have only tested the command.com that comes with a DEMO disk that can be found at datalight's page (www.datalight.com) it is 34099 bytes long, and I *was* able to create directories and files in this directories with it.

*) Maitre Kiwi mea culpa:
I know that a file name ctload.exe may be misleading, but I didn't wanted to do any changes to the original Creative Labs file.

*) General about RAMDisk:
1. Reboot - while "developing" I have some funny behaviour of the cal even after resetting, this was probably because my first version wrote something to the RAM after 103 Kb (which is the end of system memory for ROM1.01) and this part of RAM is not erased. Side note User memory starts somwhere around 112Kb (256-144)! But I am almost sure that now RamDisk uses the user memory, which is ofcourse *NOT* erased after reboot, but the calc doesn'tknow about this structure and overwrites it. The thing which is removed after reset is the device driver (those resident around 300 bytes of RD.sys and CTLOAD "shell") any other TSRs (like enter.com). So it could be possible to write another version of rd.sys that would check if a RamDisk contents are already at user's memory.

OK, next part soon...

[Roeoender]

More about RamDisk:
When RamDrive is installed it sets up 3 first sectors that contain information about drive parameters (sector size, max root dir amount etc.) and info about files & dirs on the drive (which are simply NULL) the rest of the sectors are read according to that information.
So you can assume that drive is already formatted after running ctload and rd.sys (ofcourse there is allways space for errors/bugs/mistakes )

Now about making RamDrive not so volatile.
Few ideas:
1. As I said earlier -check previous contents of RamDrive location.
2. Copy contents of RamDisk to a Dummy BASIC file (or MemZone as 2072 named it). But this would limit the RAMdisk size to less than 64Kb (because MemZones cannot be bigger).
3. "Clone" RamDisk to a FLASH drive, I haven't investigated parameters of a FlashDisk, but it probably wouldn't be difficult to do a sector by secor copy.
I think that the third version is quite good.


I have found a method (a bit dirty right now) to INCREASE THE AMOUNT OF RAM AVAILABLE FOR .EXE/.COM programs. There is this drawback that it has to overwrite (fuck up) some user memory. But with this I was able to run WASM (which needs 110Kb of RAM!) and succesfully compiled an ASM program that even includes about 5 ASM files!
So with increased memory only 3rd methd will be usable.

Roeoender.

[Maitre Kiwi]

WOW ! when do you give to us your technic for increase memory?? it can be cool for Scorch game, it doesn't work on rom 1.01 because not enough ram !

you'r fantastic Roeoender !!!

[huhn_m]

@Roeoender:

Can you send me your version of the *better* RAMDos?
Mine is 45.432 Bytes large and if I launch it (no matter if any parameter
is appended) it says 'Not enough memory: Cannot load P:\romdos.com'.
I registered at datalight / fs-forth and downloaded they version.
I also tried the link that came with their info disk. But it's all the same.

Thanx huhn

[Roeoender]

I have ROM version 1.01 and Scorch do works on my calc
Install Linl the right way (receive System zone from the calc add Linl entry send this MemZone and send linl drive).

I don't know if this version is better, anyway I have sent it to you, huhn_m.

I will release a small program for changing available memory, when it will be finished (I have to add a text file only), I will start a new thread with it.

As for CAZIO Elektronics Clock I have received a mail with excusement (I don't know the right word) and removal of current version of this program, so I think that this subject can be closed.
Roeoender.

[Maitre Kiwi]

OUPSS !! scuse me, not on rom 1.01 but 1.03 for g100+ or FX2+ !

wow, but why do you not put it in real time on your sever [with a link on it !] ???

[huhn_m]

@roeoender:

You said the ramdrive wouldn't be deleted on rebooting the calc but
if I go to the restmenu and select Reset (0) and NO (F6) and afterwards
reinstall enter.com and rd.sys the drive R is empty!

[X-thunder28]

well !
When a demo with all for test it on us AFX ?

[Roeoender]

to Maitre Kiwi:
I try to watch out for the legal stuff, so I limit distributing "not-my" programs to minimum (or I am just to lazy to read carefully datalight's legal info).

to huhn_m:
I just cannot explain it more clearly, that I did it before, sorry.

X-thunder28 and everybody:
It is available now and for all! Just read the new thread "RoeDisk + Enter + MaxMem = "AFX-PC" ".

Roeoender.