[Coco] Rolling My Own Version Of the NitrOS-9 'OS9BOOT' File

[Luis Antoniosi (CoCoDemus)]

I....I....I... don't remember what did you said at the beginning ?

Dude, or you put bullets in your questions or you make people sick reading
your emails :P

anyway i think you should go for the repository (mercurial and checkout the
lwtools-port branch). Looking the makefiles for each nos-9 level you will
understand better what are the mandatory modules for a successful boot and
how it works. After that you can customize them as you wish.





On Sat, Mar 9, 2013 at 11:08 PM, Kip Koon <computerdoc at sc.rr.com> wrote:

> I’d like to get a 51 column version of NitrOS-9 running on XRoar, but so
> far
> I have not been able to roll my own successful OS9BOOT file in VCC using
> NitrOS-9 Level 2 a while back.  Now to be fair I’m writing this email
> before
> I try rolling a custom version of NitrOS-9 Level 1 in XRoar.  I do have
> default configurations successfully booting in both VCC and XRoar now as
> mentioned in another email.  I use to ‘config’ my own versions of both OS-9
> Level 1 & Level 2 decades ago, but I know that the boot process has been
> changed.  I even had 4 fully functional half-height 5 ¼” Double sided 40trk
> and 80trk drives, 2 of each,  running in a very robust off-white metal
> enclosure that I had bought with 2 full height (3” tall) 5 ¼” floppy drives
> already installed and running.  It has two DB25 connectors on the back to
> interface to the disk controller.  I wanted four  5 ¼” floppy drives
> online,
> so I had to go through several floppy drives, floppy disk controllers plus
> customized cables and various OS9BOOT file configurations until I finally
> arrived at the sweet hardware and software configuration I wanted.  It took
> quite a while since back then I was mostly by myself figuring all this out.
> Yes, I had and still have the four floppy drives still mounted in that
> cabinet along with all those floppy disk controllers from Disto and others.
> I believe the Disto controller was the one that actually made available all
> four drive selects so I could accomplish all this.  I will be getting this
> setup running again along with replacing my old MFM 8-bit Winchester Hard
> Drive Controller Card Coco Cartridge from ‘Burke and Burke’ with the
> SuperIDE Hard Drive Controller Cartridge as I too have a boat-load of old
> 1,
> 2, 4, 6, and 8GB IDE hard drives laying in a box just waiting to be
> revived.
> The thing I need to know is since I downloaded the NitrOS-9 documentation a
> couple of years ago, has the documentation been updated with all the
> changes
> that have taken place since then including all the very recent changes?  I
> have not looked at the docs since then, so I’d like to know which file in
> the NitrOS-9 Documentation should I read to thoroughly understand ALL the
> requirements of the OS9BOOT file as NitrOS-9 requires it to be setup and
> which commands to use to actually create the OS9BOOT file.  I’ve heard of
> cobbler, but I don’t understand it yet.  I also remember seeing two script
> files that can be copied and modified to create a custom boot
> configuration,
> but what are the actual commands to do the job, or should I go back to
> experimenting with the scripts until I get the sweet configuration I need.
> I know that things have to end up on or close to an 8KB boundary, and if
> things spill over, then the next 8KB block is used as well.  Recently
> someone provided an excellent explanation of the boot requirements and the
> proper construction of the OS9BOOT file which I will look for and review.
> Please excuse and overlook the long email, but I wanted you all to know my
> exact needs and desired configuration.  After I am successful with the 51
> column version of NitrOS-9 6809 Level 1 v03.02.09, I will be setting up
> identical hardware for my Coco 3 using NirOS-9 6809 Level 2 v03.02.09.
> Later I will even play with OS-9 Level 3!  Big plans I know, but I have
> always thought big anyway.  Just wait ‘til I get my Cocos upgraded with
> 6309s…  J
>
> Kip
>
>
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>



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Long live the CoCo