[Coco] OS9-L2 vs NitrOS9

[Gene Heskett]

On Saturday 20 September 2008, Tim Fadden wrote:
>To Bob and all,
>
>I beg your pardon for speaking from emotion, and perception. (always a
>risky start!)  Its been a long time since I originally got my os9 hard
>drive system up and running, and when I look at the over 400 commands I
>have there compared to the 84 on the Nitros9, at first glance it looks
>stripped. Also as an example, the dir command is stripped to 2 options
>from the 7 options, and wild card usage with the dir I have. Perhaps the
>dir I have is not stock. But those are some of my first impressions.
>Again to be fair thats like comparing a 30 year old tackle box to a
>brand new one!  sorry!
>
>I have been  working on getting Nitros9 on a real floppy in order to
>start working with it.  But up until recently the only way has been to
>build a new/old PC.  I don't want another PC.  Fortunately thanks to You
>Bob.  I have found a way!  os9dsk!  I zmodem'd the .dsk images to my
>coco, and at first glance appeared to be going to work, but I believe
>os9dsk only works with single sided 160k images. Is this so? When I get
>time, I will try to learn the source and figure it out.  It does a dir
>fine on the double sided images, but after about 1/2 why through using
>-proc to pull the files off, garbage goes to the text screen, some times
>a lock up, :-) and thats all I get.   So for now I am using vcc to put
>the Nitros9 files on  40tss images and will transfer them over, and see
>what I can get.
>
>Perhaps I will write my memoirs of the process. :-)
>
>Tim Fadden
>
How handy are you with basic09?

If you format a 3.5" disk to 720k (use a DD diskette), then it should be easy 
for basic09 to open one of those .dsk images, find out how big it is, divide 
that by 256 to get the number of sectors it is, then open the disk drive 
using the /dx@ syntax so its a raw write, read 256 bytes from the .dsk, write 
it to the floppy, and loop/repeat until all the .dsk has been read, and all 
of it has been written to the floppy disk.

If you did it right, it should boot.

The .dsk is an image of the floppy.  Nothing special.

> Bob Devries wrote:
>> I was under the (possibly mistaken) impression that NitrOS9 was at
>> least 90% compatible with stock Tandy OS9.
>>
>> Certainly, I have run all the software which I usually use without any
>> problems.
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Tim Fadden" <t.fadden at cox.net>
>> To: "CoCoList for Color Computer Enthusiasts" <coco at maltedmedia.com>
>> Sent: Saturday, September 20, 2008 3:51 PM
>> Subject: Re: [Coco] OS9-L2 vs NitrOS9
>>
>>> I agree. Nitros9 is fine if you are a guru programmer and can create
>>> your own drivers and programs, But the OS is so stripped down there
>>> is little left of any use other than to manipulate the os.
>>>
>>> I personally would prefer to go a bit slower, and have everything at
>>> hand. If I wanna go fast I get on my vista64 machine.
>>>
>>> Now much trouble would it be for the people with the know-how and
>>> source to create the drivers/software to use the new stuff on OS9L2,
>>> the ORIGINAL coco3 os9 with tons of software available for it.
>>>
>>> No disrespect to those who have spent countless hours tweaking and
>>> creating Nitros9, but I think they have tweaked themselves into a
>>> corner.
>>>
>>> Tim
>>>
>>> George Ramsower wrote:
>>>> I'm curious about this:
>>>>
>>>> Nitros9 is somewhat faster than OS9 and requires a Hitachi 6309
>>>> chip. Of course, there's Nitros9-6809 but still, it's Nitros9.
>>>>
>>>> In recent times, some folks have introduced new hardware which is
>>>> really cool stuff but, the drivers and whatever other software
>>>> provided in the package claim to be  Nitros9 stuff.
>>>>
>>>> There are a few of these hardware things that interest me. Next
>>>> month, I'm getting three of those Pupo style? keyboard things to put
>>>> a PC type keyboard on a coco.  It's a Plug-N-Play thing that will
>>>> work. I'm almost out of keyboards now.  I think it's Cloud 9 that
>>>> handles or makes those. It would eliminate that darned, fat and
>>>> cumbersome ribbon cable I use to relocate the Coco keyboard.
>>>>
>>>> The vendors which have other products that interest me, advertise
>>>> they provide Nitros9 drivers.
>>>>
>>>> This is why I haven't acquired any of the latter items available to
>>>> date. I have asked the vendors if those drivers would work on my OS9
>>>> L2 system and haven't received replies.
>>>>
>>>>  So there are two questions in this post...
>>>>
>>>> 1. Will a Nitros9 driver work on a Mircroware OS9 system on a 64K
>>>> CC  or a CC3?
>>>> 2. Have we abandoned OS-9?
>>>>
>>>>  I suppose if #1 is FALSE and  #2 is TRUE, then I'm in real trouble.
>>>> I think it would take me months to convert to Nitros9, given the
>>>> time I have available. I'm using three cocos at this time. One has a
>>>> hard drive, the CNC coco is not just a CNC coco. The ports are
>>>> versatile and I have numerous OS9 boot disks with special boot
>>>> files, startups and software(B09) dedicated to the task at hand.
>>>> Some use graphics. Converting all this stuff to Nitros9 would be a
>>>> monumental task I think. The third coco is a 64K unit and does
>>>> simple tasks for my house. I use OS9 on that one also. I have about
>>>> a dozen special boot disks for that one.  The computer with the hard
>>>> drive only has three. The CNC coco has now has fourteen boot disks.
>>>> Only two operate the milling machine. The rest do suff like  operate
>>>> my darkroom/enlarger, monitoring the weather(looking for water),
>>>> turning lights on and off... and more
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Heck! It seems I"m being left in the dust behind the pack while
>>>> using OS9 L2...... Dangit!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> George
>>>>
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>>>
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-- 
Cheers, Gene
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Still looking for the glorious results of my misspent youth.  Say, do you
have a map to the next joint?