Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!oddjob!uwvax!dogie!uwmcsd1!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ut-sally!utah-cs!utah-gr!uplherc!sp7040!wsccs!terry From: terry@wsccs.UUCP (terry) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: CLtd (Was: 2090 SCSI driver needed) Message-ID: <323@wsccs.UUCP> Date: 15 Mar 88 06:29:22 GMT References: <1946@leo.UUCP> <5074@swan.ulowell.edu> <256@wsccs.UUCP> <3449@cbmvax.UUCP> Distribution: comp Lines: 129 Summary: OH, I don't know... In article <3449@cbmvax.UUCP>, andy@cbmvax.UUCP (Andy Finkel) writes: > In article <256@wsccs.UUCP> terry@wsccs.UUCP (terry) writes: > > >> CLtd's support sucks rocks. If you have a technical question > >> (anything more techincal than "how do I hook it up") they can't answer > >> you. Sure, they'll get one of the technicians to call you. > > > > And he will tell you how to correctly tie your socks. I am still > >waiting for a call on how I am supposed to open a serial port via the > > I know I'm going to regret asking this: but why do you expect a > peripheral manufacturing company to help you write programs ? They wrote the OS and built the hardware... they damn well better know how to talk to it, don't you think? Or are you leaking something about the OS. > They make hard disks, and similar things. > I mean, the guys at C-Ltd might be nice guys, but what reason > do they have to help you write your programs ? My (again truncated) question "in question" was in reference to how to do something VIA the OS. I _CAN_ do it by thaking over, but everybody tells me "that isn't nice!". If I am supposed to write something that conforms to some CLtd multi-tasking standard, I would appreciate being told how I can conform, given my restraints. > Could this explain why they are not much help ? Hardly. Again, who wrote the OS, elves? Elvis? > > >"standard" interfaces and then hang (can you say "hibernate"?) until I > >either get input from the console or the serial port, so as to not have to > >poll, thereby taking CPU time. I am also waiting for a call back on how you > >are supposed to have a program boost it's own priority, yet still work with > >the 68010, et al, and NOT have to resort to supervisor state. This will let > > Well, you might try looking it up in the manuals, rather than > bothering C-Ltd. Yeah, right. The A1000 ROM Kernal manual does me a lot of good, given that it is written for the '86 or so revision of the OS on a machine no longer being sold. What are the differences I should watch for? How do I maintain compatability with 1.x where x>2? > Most people use Signals to Wait on several events on the Amiga. > (See the Exec manual for details) That would be nice, except you can not then use an alarm in Aztec 3.4 as it conflicts with the timer, giving as colorful results as the same type of event does under VMS. It seems multiple outstanding events of the same type blow up in certain cases... > The FindTask() call in combination with the SetTaskPri() call lets > you change priorities around. I don't recommend this, unless > you know what you are doing. What about "I want this task to have priority x where x is 10 greater than any other user task's priority"? > A word of advice...the best programs that run on a machine notice > what machine that they run on. I should not have to "notice" what machine I'm on to be good. Perhaps it won't be "best", but it _will_ be good. The whole point of an HLL is to *not* notice. > For instance, most 68000 programs > know to word align data. Obviously, I would have pretty severe problems if I were so stupid as to not correctly align my structures/variables. I assume a compiler will do this for me. > The worst programs are the quick ports. I would correct this to "The worst programs are those that can't be ported quickly. The programs which run worst are those that were ported quickly anyway." > AmigaTerm, written entirely in C, works at 9200 BAUD *without* flow control > (this is faster than a VT101) With flow control it works fine at 19.2KB. It's not faster than my VT101.. you must have 50Hz power... what else do you have running at the same time, may I ask? You should be able to do 9600 baud with multiple users and only 20% of the CPU in use. If Tandy can do it with their 68000 box by virtue of Microsoft Xenix, Commodore ought to be able to do it with 50% overhead with a single user. Besides, AmigaTerm cheats: 1) it was written by people with access to current docs 2) you can't run much else 3) it seems that it uses a ANSI 3.64 console driver... that is _NOT_ emulating. > loosely on the baud rate. > > >losing characters. Commodore says they can go MIDI speeds and still multi > >-task ...this may be true, but the driver's passing stuff to me at about > >2400 baud or less, depending on system loading. > > Only if you use it poorly. Oh. You mean by caring about things like "parity" and "wordlength"... you know, communication program-type things. You know, those things Telenet, Tymenet, DataPac, and Western Union use? > > What about a DMA controller using FFS? The truth is, they can't > >build one either. I only know of one out there, and it's ...well, sorta > >pretending to do DMA. Can't they even use one of their 26 channels? > You really need to check out the Amiga hardware manual, and the A500/A2000 > Technical Manual before you continue about things like this. > Really. Make one available. Really. Just because you have one, doesn't mean I can go buy one at my Amiga dealer. > The A2090 hard disk controller card does use DMA. > Its a Zorro-2 card; there are several companies who make cages that > let A1000 owners use Zorro-II cards. Wonderful. Patchwork hardware. But is there an expansion box from CLtd that won't violate the warranty, like Commodore claims the others do? | Terry Lambert UUCP: ...{ decvax, ihnp4 }... | | @ Century Software or : ...utah-cs!uplherc!sp7040!obie!wsccs!terry | | SLC, Utah | | These opinions are not my companies, but if you find them | | useful, send a $20.00 donation to Brisbane Australia... | | 'There are monkey boys in the facility. Do not be alarmed; you are secure' |