Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uwm.edu!uakari.primate.wisc.edu!ctrsol!cica!iuvax!rutgers!att!chinet!saj
From: saj@chinet.chi.il.us (Stephen Jacobs)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: ROM disassembly for TOS -- A suggestion.
Summary: If only it was so... (some may differ)
Message-ID: <9564@chinet.chi.il.us>
Date: 13 Sep 89 16:21:17 GMT
References: <8909091247.AA16274@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU> <9531@chinet.chi.il.us> <1992@hudson.acc.virginia.edu>
Organization: Chinet - Chicago, Ill.
Lines: 25

In article <1992@hudson.acc.virginia.edu>, gl8f@astsun7.astro.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl) writes:
> 
> Atari distributes source for the BIOS and XBIOS in the dev kit docs.
> 
> From what they've said, they DON'T OWN the source to the VDI, AES, and
> GEMDOS. I have gathered this from comments made here and elsewhere.
> They have been fixing bugs by decompiling pieces of it. [If I'm wrong,
> someone please correct me...]
>
What we're discussing is related to the difference between past and future.
Apparently the earliest developer documentation included source for BIOS and
XBIOS (and startup code, and a lot of housekeeping code).  Newer developer
kits do not.  VDI is someone else's property, I think, but I think Atari
bought AES outright; GEMDOS has been rewritten, apparently from scratch,
apparently more than once.
    Anyway, what some of us would like is the actual code (with comments)
of as much TOS as possible.  The sensible ones among us (most, I hope) want
it only as programming examples and authoritative documentation.
   It surprises me that the letters I'm getting in regard to this discussion
include a few from people who agree with total non-disclosure, saying that
given a chance, programmers will do things that cause version-dependence.
Still, given the record of the PC, I think official commented ROM code helps
a computer more than it hurts.
                                      Steve J.