DOS2.5 with ATR8000 RS232 driver?

[erichenneke]

I've been hunting around and not finding. 

 

What should I use to get an ATR8000 RS232 working under Atari DOS2.5?

 

MyDOS is easy of course.   Just realized I don't think I've ever used the RS-232 on the ATR8000 with DOS2.5 though. 

 

Thanks!

-Eric

 

 

[erichenneke]

Hmmm, silence.   

 

Does that mean there is no such beast?   I am starting to wonder. 

 

Is there a way to use the RS-232 port of the ATR8000 with DOS2.5?   Or any Atari DOS 2.X for that matter?

 

-Eric

 

[Dr Memory]

I do not know the answer to your question.

 

The reason I posted is because I'm curious as to why you'd want to use DOS 2.5 with your ATR8000 serial port.  Rather than one of the versions of MyDos that directly support it.  You don't have to say, but if we knew that maybe we could suggest something?

 

I used MyDos 3.18 with mine in the old days, and it let me use 1.2MB 5.25" drives, a USR modem, and an Epson printer, all through the ATR8000.  I also set up my own 80 column driver and some other things for use when I felt like messing with CP/M.  I suspect Atari DOS 2.5 is missing a few pieces to allow all that to work, but perhaps you only really need the serial part?

 

I think I vaguely recall getting SmartDOS and one of the other wierd DOSes sort of working way back when, but they each had a little set of limitations.  Details of that are lost to time.

[erichenneke]

26 minutes ago, Dr Memory said:

I do not know the answer to your question.

 

The reason I posted is because I'm curious as to why you'd want to use DOS 2.5 with your ATR8000 serial port.  Rather than one of the versions of MyDos that directly support it.  You don't have to say, but if we knew that maybe we could suggest something?

 

I used MyDos 3.18 with mine in the old days, and it let me use 1.2MB 5.25" drives, a USR modem, and an Epson printer, all through the ATR8000.  I also set up my own 80 column driver and some other things for use when I felt like messing with CP/M.  I suspect Atari DOS 2.5 is missing a few pieces to allow all that to work, but perhaps you only really need the serial part?

 

I think I vaguely recall getting SmartDOS and one of the other wierd DOSes sort of working way back when, but they each had a little set of limitations.  Details of that are lost to time.

yeah, VERY good question.    

 

I actually MUCH prefer MYDOS and that's my normal "go to" DOS for just about everything. 

 

What led me down this path was that I wanted to use the ATR-8000 RS-232 via the R: device, and also use Turbo Basic XL at the same time.

So far I haven't found a way to load up MYDOS with ATR-8000 RS-232 handler active and also get Turbo Basic XL to work. 

Really, that's what I TRULY am pursuing here. 

 

But, in the process of trying to figure that out, I considered whether the combination of Atari DOS 2.5  +  ATR-8000 + RS-232 + Turbo Basic XL   was possible ?  And I realized I had never seen such a beast.  

 

Anyway...  being able to use MYDOS + ATR-8000 + RS-232 + Turbo Basic XL   would actually be my PREFERENCE though!  So if anyway has that solution, that would be even better.   

 

-Eric

 

[+Nezgar]

I don't know, but could it just be an AUTORUN.SYS type file like the 850 that could be copied from MyDOS to DOS 2.5?

[Dr Memory]

I did a little investigation, to satisfy my own curiosity.  Here is what I learned:

 

MyDos 3.18 is indeed the ATR8000 RS232 version.  Or at least, one of the three flavors of 3.18 is.

 

BM301318 lets you generate any of those three flavors:

 

    STANDARD MYDOS

    ATR8000 RS232 VERSION

    KERNEL AND STANDARD MYDOS

 

The ATR8000/RS232 VERSION requires only the correct version of DOS.SYS and DUP.SYS to boot.  There is no AUTORUN.SYS type file produced, and the bootable 3.18 version of this flavor contains only DOS and DUP.  If you play with it, you can see that it includes the needed code to format 8" drives and such.  I've pretty much convinced myself that all the ATR8000 stuff, including the RS232 stuff, is baked in to that version of DUP.SYS.

 

On the BM disk you can see the three versions of DUP, called NEWDUP.A, NEWDUP.B, and NEWDUP.C.  If you disassemble them, and search for "232" in each, you will find it is present in NEWDUP.B and is not present in the others.  More evidence for the RS232 support being baked into that version.

 

I wasn't curious enough to fully disassemble it, but at least I've confirmed where the ATR8000 and RS232 code lives.  The "O" option in the MyDos menu allows you to configure the ATR8000 RS232 port.  It doesn't actually DO that in Altirra, of course, but you can see what it's trying to do at least.

 

So if you really wanted to pull that code and try and use it with some other DOS, that's a starting point - disassemble NEWDUP.B, isolate the needed code, and make an AUTORUN out of it (or set it up to be loadable some other way, of course).  Note that you'd also have to deal with the needed config stuff if you did that - real RS232 has more moving parts than SIO and I imagine you'd want to be able to configure flow control and such.

 

My BBS actually ran under Basic XL and later Basic XE, using that version of MyDos.  I never used Turbo Basic XL but have to think this is probably a conflict with that and MyDos.  The usual failure mode for that sort of thing is memory conflicts between the DOS and the program.  This version of MyDos worked fine with the Basic XL and Basic XE carts, BTW.  So if you just want a better Basic and aren't able to fix the Turbo Basic XL conflict, you might be able to use one of those?  No idea if it would work with the cracked file versions though, I had real carts and don't have an ATR8000 to test on at present.

 

The wikipedia page for Turbo Basic XL says that source was released - it was published as a type-in program in Happy Computer magazine (auf Deutsch).  Apparently there exist versions that people have modified to be compatible with various DOSes.  If it were me, I'd start down that path and see if I could either find a version already made to work with MyDos 3.18 or the source code and go from there.

 

Hope this helped.

[Dr Memory]

Ok, I was curious about the source for Turbo Basic XL, so I went looking for the correct issue of Happy Computer.  I found a copy on pigwa.  Yay!

 

Indeed, the code is there in type-in form.  Unfortunately, it isn't source code - more of an ASCII version of a binary dump.  So that didn't really work out too well for me.

 

However, a little more searching revealed this: 

 

Someone already did the heavy lifting and obtained and released the source, on this very web site.  Awesome!  So there's your starting point - if you want to use Turbo Basic XL with your ATR8000, it should be very possible to modify the source (or possibly just some constants?) to generate a version that would work with the correct version of MyDos.  That sounds easier to me than developing new serial and disk drivers!

 

Still some work, but doable methinks.  Hope this helped, and many thanks to those that helped find and release the source.  Next time I have free time I'll check it out.

[luckybuck]

Yeah great, TB should be in version 2.0 at least, 2.11 even better. The source code belongs to version 2.x...

3.2q is for SpartaDOS...

Version 1.5 is old.

TB is not smooth running with the FastMath routines, we are working on that...

 

 

 

[dmsc]

Hi!

1 hour ago, luckybuck said:

Yeah great, TB should be in version 2.0 at least, 2.11 even better. The source code belongs to version 2.x...

3.2q is for SpartaDOS...

Version 1.5 is old.

TB is not smooth running with the FastMath routines, we are working on that...

It was determined the "source" posted was not really the original source, and not a new version, it was simply a disassembly with some minor modifications to support the TURBO-2000 cassette system. Sadly, the original source is not known, and probably lost.

 

21 hours ago, Dr Memory said:

Someone already did the heavy lifting and obtained and released the source, on this very web site.  Awesome!  So there's your starting point - if you want to use Turbo Basic XL with your ATR8000, it should be very possible to modify the source (or possibly just some constants?) to generate a version that would work with the correct version of MyDos.  That sounds easier to me than developing new serial and disk drivers!

 

Still some work, but doable methinks.  Hope this helped, and many thanks to those that helped find and release the source.  Next time I have free time I'll check it out.

 

 

I have a full disassembly, with some optional fixes and minor optimizations over a github repo: https://github.com/dmsc/turbo-dis

 

Have Fun!

[a8isa1]

11 hours ago, luckybuck said:

Yeah great, TB should be in version 2.0 at least, 2.11 even better. The source code belongs to version 2.x...

3.2q is for SpartaDOS...

Version 1.5 is old.

TB is not smooth running with the FastMath routines, we are working on that...

 

 

 

Hi, luckybuck!  Great to see you are still around!

 

This is the first I've heard of Turbo BASIC XL 2.11.  Before this thread gets further derailed I urge you to start a new thread and provide a brief description of where Turbo BASIC XL stands now and where future development might be headed.

 

Thanks!

[luckybuck]

Thanks a8isa1,

 

Many stress in the last time, less for Atari, but I am still here. ?

 

Well, everything is here:

https://atariwiki.org/wiki/Wiki.jsp?page=Turbo-BASIC XL

plus the work from JAC!  in 2019 and dmsc in 2021

 

Will update this, but preserving is and must be always #1, hope you understand.

 

All the best.

 

[BillC]

On 5/17/2021 at 9:35 AM, erichenneke said:

I've been hunting around and not finding. 

 

What should I use to get an ATR8000 RS232 working under Atari DOS2.5?

 

MyDOS is easy of course.   Just realized I don't think I've ever used the RS-232 on the ATR8000 with DOS2.5 though. 

 

Thanks!

-Eric

 

I just found out there was also an ATR8000 RS232 driver included with the 1985-08 release of SpartaDOS V1.1, I don't know if it is compatible with other SpartaDOS versions but thought I would upload it in case it can help anyone.

 Available AT_RS232 R: handler for ATR8000 support

 

at_rs232.com

[a8isa1]

6 hours ago, luckybuck said:

Thanks a8isa1,

 

Many stress in the last time, less for Atari, but I am still here. ?

 

Well, everything is here:

https://atariwiki.org/wiki/Wiki.jsp?page=Turbo-BASIC XL

plus the work from JAC!  in 2019 and dmsc in 2021

 

Will update this, but preserving is and must be always #1, hope you understand.

 

All the best.

 

Sorry, I didn't say that very well. when I said "derailed" I meant by  *me* making my request of you.

 

 

[BillC]

On 5/28/2021 at 12:48 AM, BillC said:

I just found out there was also an ATR8000 RS232 driver included with the 1985-08 release of SpartaDOS V1.1, I don't know if it is compatible with other SpartaDOS versions but thought I would upload it in case it can help anyone.

 Available AT_RS232 R: handler for ATR8000 support

Attachment removed

I have discovered the floppy that contained this file has damage, AT_RS232.COM is one of 2 files that are corrupted.

There is a SpartaDOS ATR available on Atarimania that I believe has an earlier version of this driver.

 

http://www.atarimania.com/utility-atari-400-800-xl-xe-spartados_15919.html

[a8isa1]

I don't recall if I ever tried to use the serial port of the ATR8000 with DOS 2.5 so I wanted to test.  Unfortunately I no longer have a null modem or a PC with a real serial port with which connect. I decided to cobble together a NodeMCU dev board into a wifi modem for the ATR8000 for testing.  It took me quite a bit of time because I am still bad at soldering and made many mistakes. Not even sure how it started working.  The build would have been simple for anyone else. Only a small piece of prototype board, a MAX233 IC, and a card edge connector is all I used.  And, a last minute decoupling capacitor.  

 

Too late to make a long story short.  The driver I had on my work disk (ATR) for a couple decades or more does not work under Does 2.5 or 2.0 (S?).  It does work with MyDOS 4.53/4.

 

The driver seems limited to 4800 bps.  I thought (but am not certain) at some point I had found a driver that worked with the ATR8000 at 9600 bps. Hopefully one day that driver will resurface.

 

Sorry, none of this fills erichenneke's request but perhaps the driver is one that hasn't been archived. I'm posting a ZIP with ATR8000.SER and some other drivers.

 

-SteveS

 

 

A8SerialDrivers.zip

Edited June 15, 2021 by a8isa1