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Diamond GOS 3.0


walter_J64bit

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Haha... I guess it is.

 

I need to hear back from Pack007 first. It's his baby. I'm curious to hear the answers to some questions too.

 

I gotta be honest; I frankly don't like the color change with the yellow. But that's a small issue and easy enough to fix.

There's an app for that called COLORME and a copy has been attached! Thanks to Pac007 I was able to get my hands on this one!

http://www.atarimagazines.com/v8n2/diamondsystem.html

COLORME.rar

Edited by walter_J64bit
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There's an app for that called COLORME and a copy has been attached! Thanks to Pac007 I was able to get my hands on this one!

http://www.atarimagazines.com/v8n2/diamondsystem.html

 

Thanks, I knew someone had made a simple desk accessory for that (Matt Rat). I just tried it out and it works great, but the changes don't stick. If you open an app or go from an app back to the desktop, the colors will revert. So it looks like changing it in the ROM will be the best way to go.

Edited by MrFish
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I would like to thank Water_J64bit for starting this thread. I thought that everyone had Diamond 3.

 

I would also like to thank MrFish and _theDoctor_ for helping me believe I could make a good copy of the ROM.

 

And last, Allen Reeves for creating a desktop environment that still is fun to program.

 

The Diamond GOS 3.0 ROM.

DIAMGOS3.ROM

 

The file was produced using the Maxflash Cartridge Studio.

 

There are Diamond disk images scattered around this forum that should contain the support disks. I will endeavor to get a collection together and post. I have already posted the manuals and disk directories of the utility disks in the "Diamond in the Rough" blog. There are additional programs and information already there.

 

Manuals: http://atariage.com/forums/blog/556/entry-10816-diamond-gos-manuals/

Directories: http://atariage.com/forums/blog/556/entry-10840-diamonds-utilities-and-develop-disk-directories/

 

 

 

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I remember when I had my original Diamond 3.0 cartridge that it started out with the colors in the picture shown earlier, green desktop with sort of yellow menu line and icons. One day I was using it and suddenly the desktop colors changed on me to more of a blue-green desktop and cream colored icons and drop-down menu line. So I figured I had accidentally changed the colors while I was messing around with it, but I could not figure out how to change them back. So I called Allan Reeve up to ask him how to do it and he told me there was no way to change the colors (without an accessory written to do so) and acted like I was crazy and couldn't imagine how it happened (if it really did), etc.

 

I was dumbfounded and the colors never changed back and there was nothing wrong with my 130XE at the time, everything else continued to look and work like normal. it was really strange.

Edited by Gunstar
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Finding the utilities disk(with Write and Paint 3.0) was easier then I thought. This zip contains the following.

 

Utility disk ATR - used to configure your system and make a boot disk. Don't try to use Diamond without it.

Diamond GOS Manual PDF -

 

Diamond Develop ATR - Good to have if you want to write diamond software.

Diamond Develop PDF - Must read for programmers

 

 

 

Diamond GOS 3 support files.zip

 

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I would like to thank Water_J64bit for starting this thread. I thought that everyone had Diamond 3.

 

I would also like to thank MrFish and _theDoctor_ for helping me believe I could make a good copy of the ROM.

 

And last, Allen Reeves for creating a desktop environment that still is fun to program.

 

The Diamond GOS 3.0 ROM.

attachicon.gifDIAMGOS3.ROM

 

So I have no flashcart, how can I use this? I have incognito and u1mb on my two machines.. but I understand that this rom will not fit in the rom slots on those devices.

 

James

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Utility disk ATR - used to configure your system and make a boot disk. Don't try to use Diamond without it.

 

OK, colors are right when using the utilities disk. Problem solved.

 

Thanks again Pack007, this is really great to finally have.

 

I also didn't realize you had formerly scanned both manuals, so thanks for those as well.

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I would like to thank Water_J64bit for starting this thread. I thought that everyone had Diamond 3.

 

I would also like to thank MrFish and _theDoctor_ for helping me believe I could make a good copy of the ROM.

 

And last, Allen Reeves for creating a desktop environment that still is fun to program.

 

The Diamond GOS 3.0 ROM.

attachicon.gifDIAMGOS3.ROM

 

The file was produced using the Maxflash Cartridge Studio.

 

There are Diamond disk images scattered around this forum that should contain the support disks. I will endeavor to get a collection together and post. I have already posted the manuals and disk directories of the utility disks in the "Diamond in the Rough" blog. There are additional programs and information already there.

 

Manuals: http://atariage.com/forums/blog/556/entry-10816-diamond-gos-manuals/

Directories: http://atariage.com/forums/blog/556/entry-10840-diamonds-utilities-and-develop-disk-directories/

 

 

 

No Thank you for being a Homebrew programmer for Diamond and thanks for sharing Diamond 3.0 all you did was reboot my fire for GOS ;) I hope more Homebrew programmers for Diamond can come from this! :thumbsup: :thumbsup: Now I cant wait to get my Diamond cart updated to 3.0! :cool:

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Yes this type of rom can be put into the original SDX419 via eprom change.

 

I have a sparta dos cart with the passthrou.. I think that was the 4.19.. so your saying that with the right eprom ( I have a burner as well) I could just swap out the prom? What number of prom would I need please.

 

James

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OK, so got that MrFish.. thanks ;) = any chance a 27c256 would work? I have a few extra of those from Atari ST TOS burning?? I know the rom is only 64K

 

Now I guess if I want to do this.. I end up using my spartdos x cart.. not that I need it.. I have sparta x built into both my U1mb and Incognito... but can I use this on a MAXFLASH cart?? maybe this gives me an excuse to buy some?

 

 

James

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  • 3 months later...
  • 8 months later...

Is this where this thread actually ended? Seems a bit anticlimactic. This work by Mr Reeves needs to continue with interest (IMO)...not by him if he's done with it; but there are many talented people here. I've been lurking for years...been looking at several GUI's in development for the ATARI 800. Most need 64K or 128K. I was hopeful for a GUI that could fit within the 10kROM & 48kRAM limits. I'm looking at several possibilities now, seems that a simple soldering of a wire and a cutting of a trace on the PCB will allow the use of previously unavailable cartridges. The future is indeed bright for the ATARI 800...40 years later.

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I'm sure that flashjazzcat will eventually weigh in, his work seems like it's the most developed/advanced. I've read his stuff and seen all of his youtube videos. I'm not going to bug a genius. It's just amazing that we're still pushing the limits of this 8-bit machine from the 70's & 80's.

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Expect progress on my GOS project this year. Unfortunately early in 2015 - while working on the GOS project - I required changes to the U1MB BIOS in order to boot the GOS ROM, and to that end did a ground-up rewrite of the firmware for U1MB and Incognito. Having given that to the community I felt somewhat obliged to keep debugging and developing it, and here we are nearly three years later with the final "v2.0" alt firmware release pending and the same custom firmware powering U1MBs in the 1088XEL motherboards. There's also more hardware on the way which will require versions of the new loader, etc. I very much enjoy the firmware development side of things, but lack of progress on other projects is as frustrating for me as it is for others. But all adults are hopefully able to comprehend the necessity of time management and prioritisation.

 

Regarding Diamond: I did indeed download and scroll through the source code a couple of years ago but aside from admiring the clever mouse sampling and simply marvelling that Alan was able to get the GUI as good as it was at such a young age and without today's development tools, it's not something I would devote time to developing having already gotten half way through developing a multitasking graphical OS. I was in discussion with Alan regarding further development of Diamond before I even started work on the multitasking GOS, but unfortunately he went silent for a while and the promised source code never arrived, so I went off and started from scratch. The Diamond source suddenly appeared on the forum a few years later.

 

I have no intention of trying to make my OS run in 48K (or 64K, for that matter: you'll need 128K), so the only stock machine it'll run on is a 130XE, and the 128KB code base requires a banked ROM. There are quite a few "desktop metaphor" systems for the A8 which fit the bill if all you want to do is launch existing software using icons and drop-down menus.

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So, like some, this is the first I've seen or heard of Diamond GOS. It seems neat! In ROM form, does it interfere with running other programs? How would one without a ROM burner get this in cartridge form? Could it be embedded in an internal ROM? Does it have trackball or some sort of mouse support? And there are related programs which continue with the same interface?

 

Sorry to pepper with questions. I imagine that many who are not familiar with this might have several questions.

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Diamond GOS 3.0 is much better than the earlier versions. 3.0 more worthy of a look. There are a few flavors of 'GUI' out there...

 

Flash Jazz Cat's looks like it will impress

 

@FJC have you seen QTop the sinclair desktop at any time, would any of it's ideas help?

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@FJC have you seen QTop the sinclair desktop at any time, would any of it's ideas help?

I hadn't seen that one, but I've seen Doors and just about every other 8-bit GUI floating around. ;) As I mentioned, many of them present some kind of desktop metaphor which simply allows you to run legacy software with a few clicks, or are written in BASIC and thereby impose the limitation that every single GUI application has to carry the entire UI library along with it (and multitasking is entirely out of the question). For inspiration and ideas, one need look no further than SymbOS, and to set one's sights any lower at this stage would likely result in another desktop launcher.

 

The obstacles in the way of completion have less to do with a lack of ideas or solutions than a lack of hours, choosing the right approach to a given problem, and the difficulties presented by development tools (or the lack thereof). MADS's proprietary relocatable file format was never intended for the development of stand-alone applications (it appears to have been wholly aimed at the linker), and yet I chose to re-purpose the format for the production of GOS apps. It works quite well, but does not allow more than a single segment per file, meaning that it's impossible - for example - to write SDX-style driver modules with one absolute segment, a relocatable main memory segment, and a relocatable extended memory segment, with fix-up tables indexing all three. Of course, these limitations can be worked around, but every solution selected involves difficult compromises.

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@Flashjazzcat - It's going to be a monumental achievement, whenever you complete it. I'll make sure that I have 128k at that point. It's frustrating that the stinkin' C64 had GEOS - that was a contentious point amongst my C64 friends in junior high...30 years ago.

 

What I did back then was what I could, I found an 80-column display program and typed it in and saved it to my 1050. I also wrote my own art program and had hi-res (192x320) with multi-colors - that was through the RF though. I created my own GUI at that time. Using a joystick as a mouse and using a missile graphic as an arrow pointer. I toyed around with moving windows and then my Father bought me an Amiga.

 

I'm really missing those old days though - life and computing shouldn't be that easy. We all need challenges.

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