Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!uwm.edu!gem.mps.ohio-state.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!PENNDRLS.UPENN.EDU!GTHEALL From: GTHEALL@PENNDRLS.UPENN.EDU (George A. Theall) Newsgroups: comp.sys.dec.micro Subject: Rainbow Echomail Digest Message-ID: <8910251255.AA20146@remote.dccs.upenn.edu> Date: 25 Oct 89 13:56:00 GMT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: The Internet Lines: 263 Rainbow Echomail Digest OCT 25, 1989 In this issue: FOUND TRACTOR FOR DECW4 RE: QUME SPRINT/11 PRINTE (3 messages) RE: RE: DEC RAINBOW DISK (2 messages) DEC RAINBOW 100 DISK FORS RAINBOW VIDEO-FOSSIL (2 messages) COPYING (READING) IBM SIN BUG EXPOSED! FLOPPY DRIVE ROW Articles posted to either INFO-DEC-MICRO or comp.sys.dec.micro are currently gatewayed automatically to the Rainbow Echo on Fidonet; thus, you do need not to take any special action to respond to articles in these digests. Please send reports of problems or suggestions for improvement of this digest to GTHEALL@PENNDRLS.UPENN.EDU (ARPA Internet). ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Date: 10-22-89 (16:54) Subject: FOUND TRACTOR FOR DECW4 From: ERIC SPEARS ARE YOU OFFERING A DW IV 4 SALE? HOW MUCH? LEAVE $ AND I'LL CHECK AROUND FOR A POSSIBLE BUYER. --- TMail v1.12a * Origin: Total Access Board 138/103 Tacoma, Wa (206)472-9884 (1:138/103) ------------------------------ Date: 10-22-89 (16:56) Subject: RE: QUME SPRINT/11 PRINTE From: ERIC SPEARS THANKS FOR THE REPLY FRANK, I FOUND THAT THE QUME INERFACE HAD BEEN MODIFIED TO HANDLE THE VICTOR 9000'S SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT OUTPUT. IS RAINBOW PRINTER PORT PINTOUT THE SAME AS AN IBM? --- TMail v1.12a * Origin: Total Access Board 138/103 Tacoma, Wa (206)472-9884 (1:138/103) ------------------------------ Date: 10-22-89 (09:22) Subject: RE: RE: DEC RAINBOW DISK From: ERIC SPEARS WHAT ABOUT COMMERCIAL PROGRAM "UNIFORM" FROM MICROSOLUTIONS (I THINK) AND PERHAPS XENOCOPY? --- * Origin: Horsefeathers + Burn a flag for freedom! + (Opus 1:343/30) ------------------------------ Date: 10-22-89 Subject: DEC RAINBOW 100 DISK FORS From: GEOFF REED MM> Hmmm. Do you mean that it defaults to 8 sectors/track when you tell MM> it to format a single sided diskette? That would make sense. Thank you. MM> I'll have to try it! MM> No, it defaults to 9 sectors /track Hence the 179,000 or so bytes of free disk space on the disk that's been formatted, it's just that whoever told you that your rainbow can only read 8-sector single-sided disks is WRONG, it can read 9-sector single-sided disks fine (at least all of the rainbows I know of in the greater seattle area have no problem doing this, so you shoul either...) --- msged 1.99L MSC * Origin: StarShip_Inconnu, Cruisin' the Stars (1:343/3.1) ------------------------------ Date: 10-22-89 Subject: RAINBOW VIDEO-FOSSIL From: GEOFF REED ER> > Well, apparently there are a few mites in msged, but the video ER> problem ER> >was with the vfos_dec. Unfortunatly..... ER> ER> It's working fine here. As a matter of fact, I test the vfossil with ER> msged and my own routines. If you have the disappearing text problem, ER> change your color definitions in msged.cfg. ER> ER> Ed What color definitions?? I've tried switching them all to white/black and white + intense / black to no avail, my text still disappears after the 24th column or so..... what version of dos are you using?? --- msged 1.99L MSC * Origin: StarShip_Inconnu, Cruisin' the Stars (1:343/3.1) ------------------------------ Date: 10-23-89 Subject: RAINBOW VIDEO-FOSSIL From: GEOFF REED ER> It's working fine here. As a matter of fact, I test the vfossil with ER> msged and my own routines. If you have the disappearing text problem, ER> change your color definitions in msged.cfg. Ed, here are my color definitions..., I can't figure out what's going wrong, Bink seems to be working fine, Msged on the other hand is displaying 24 to 30 columns and then the characters are invisible, (that's with 0.25, 0.24 works great) video fossil color normal whi / bla color warn bla+ / whi color quote bla / whi color block bla / whi+ color info whi+ / bla color hilite whi+ / bla --- msged 1.998x * Origin: StarShip_Inconnu, Cruisin' the Stars (1:343/3) ------------------------------ Date: 10-23-89 (08:49) Subject: COPYING (READING) IBM SIN From: AMER NELSON Geoff is correct. I quote from the User's Guide which is a part of the MS-DOS documentation (Appendix C, page C-1) -- "The Rainbow MS-DOS operating system can copy an 8-sector or 9-sector, single-sided IBM diskette." Straight from the horses mouth. ++ Amer ++ --- * Origin: Glacier Peak Rainbow, Bellevue, WA - 206/644-8431 (Opus 1:343/3) ------------------------------ Date: 10-23-89 (11:09) Subject: RE: RE: DEC RAINBOW DISK From: VAN VANHORN I had been told that Uniform wouldn't read RX-50, so why pay money for it for that purpose? I use Uniform to read Altos disks on the AT, and that works nicely. I wouldn't want to use Uniform, because then I would have to re-run Uniform every time I switched formats; now E: is the RX-50, F: is Altos. I don't know about Xenocopy. I should probably not have been so emphatic in the first message. And you should hit your shift lock key, your message was entered in all upper case. If it hadn't been entered here on this system, I wouldn't have even read it. Van --- * Origin: Horsefeathers + Burn a flag for freedom! + (Opus 1:343/30) ------------------------------ Date: 10-23-89 Subject: BUG EXPOSED! From: GEOFF REED ER>I'll continue to see if it can be fixed from within the vfossil. I ER>should have a new version shortly, mostly bug fixes of this kind. ER> ER>If you notice any other problems with the DEC vfossil, feel free to ER>give a shout. Thanks Ed, at least I know what to do to get the vfossil to work now! --- msged 1.998x * Origin: StarShip_Inconnu, Cruisin' the Stars (1:343/3) ------------------------------ Date: 10-22-89 (17:10) Subject: FLOPPY DRIVE From: GEORGE TURNER I am trying to understand the process that goes into formatting a floppy disc. Is it the drive controller or FORMAT that formats the disc. If you connected a non-RX50 disc drive to the 'Bow's floppy controller would it work? What would happen if you tried to format a disk in such a set up? --- * Origin: Midnight DEC - The place for DEC sales & information (Opus 1:101/45) ------------------------------ Date: 10-23-89 (20:20) Subject: RE: QUME SPRINT/11 PRINTE From: BILL MAYHEW Define "can't get it working..." Does it do NOTHING at all, or...?? I remember from years ago when I had a Sprint/9 that it used the opposite pins for transmit and receive than what I expected. I had to build a cable that swapped pins 2 and 3. Beyond that, if you tell it to ignore incoming RS232 control signals, it should work; as I recall, the Qume will support XON/XOFF, which is just what the Rainbow prefers for flow control. --- ConfMail V4.00 * Origin: Still Servicing the Rainbow - Maybee Forever (1:101/1) ------------------------------ Date: 10-24-89 (11:55) Subject: RE: QUME SPRINT/11 PRINTE From: FRANK MALLORY > THANKS FOR THE REPLY FRANK, I FOUND THAT THE QUME INERFACE > HAD BEEN MODIFIED TO HANDLE THE VICTOR 9000'S SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT > OUTPUT. IS RAINBOW PRINTER PORT PINTOUT THE SAME AS AN > IBM? I'm going to let someone else more familiar than I with the nuts and bolts answer your question. My impression, tho, is that a short answer would be "no". The "standard" printer interface on the IBM is a parallel one; the connector, however, is a female 25-pin RS-232 serial type. Assuming you are talking about the serial interface for the PC, you are closer but not quite there. I would suggest you look on pg. 58 of the Rainbow Owner's Manual, where there is a table showing the printer connector signals, and decide for yourself what kind of cable or interface you need. BTW, is there some way to turn off Caps Lock on the terminal you are using? --- * Origin: Silver Bullet - Silver Spring, Maryland - 301-622-2247 (Opus 1:109/1 ------------------------------ Date: 10-24-89 (14:12) Subject: ROW From: FRANK MALLORY OK, now I have what I need to take on Sun, Silicon Graphics, and the rest of those overpriced workstations: RAINBOW OFFICE WORKSTATION! Somebody just came into the office and dropped an unopened copy of this gem on my desk. You can bet I wasted no time in installing this powerful, new (1985) tool on my 'bow. Had a little trouble registering, tho, because when I say "ROW" it says "System requires CONFIG.SYS" (which of course, I have) and dumps me back to MS-DOS. Undaunted, I went onto my VAX to register there, giving the specified command "@RBC$TOOLS:INITUSR.COM". Unfortunately, my 750 seems to be a few years behind the times, because it couldn't find that particular file. So here I am: my ship has come in, but I'm dead in the water until I can get the 'bow and VAX to accept my registration. What should I do next? --- * Origin: Silver Bullet - Silver Spring, Maryland - 301-622-2247 (Opus 1:109/1 ------------------------------