[Coco] format memory (was) Gotek floppy emulator

[Gene Heskett]

On Tuesday 16 February 2016 23:33:18 Christopher R. Hawks wrote:

> On Tue, 16 Feb 2016 17:04:21 -0500
>
> Gene Heskett <gheskett at wdtv.com> wrote:
> > On Tuesday 16 February 2016 15:25:53 Tormod Volden wrote:
> > > On Tue, Feb 16, 2016 at 1:25 PM, Gene Heskett wrote:
> > > > On Monday 15 February 2016 20:29:02 Bill Pierce via Coco wrote:
> > > >>  Gene, on both my emulator and real Coco, smap shows 11k free.
> > > >> As I said, I can format from the cmd line, but not from within
> > > >> something else like the boot script from the ditro disks.
> > > >>
> > > >> One thing I've noticed is that 3.3.0 does not like older
> > > >> drivers. It fares better with drivers built from the same
> > > >> build. Are all your drivers in the 3.3.0 boot current? Or did
> > > >> you use some of your older custom drivers? I even formatted my
> > > >> 4 gig partions on my Glenside IDE with with my current boot.
> > > >
> > > > I did go down & play. I also have 11k free but its fragmented.
> > >
> > > Dear OS-9 experts, please bear with me and my lack of deep Level2
> > > understanding, I am in the need for a long Q&A session on this. I
> > > have read the "OS-9 system programmer's manual" from Microware
> > > which is the best piece on OS-9 internals that I have found. Are
> > > there other good texts, apart from reading the "source" code?
> > > "Source" in quotes, because a lot of it is half-commented
> > > disassembly of binaries :p
> > >
> > > OK, so you have 11k free. I suppose this is system memory (limited
> > > to 64KB), whereas programs can use their own 64KB user memory
> > > mapped in from the big pool (512KB to 2MB).
> > >
> > > > Format needs $2b70 worth of memory for its data, or 11,120
> > > > bytes.
> > >
> > > Format needs 11120 bytes of user memory, right? This is the data
> > > segment pointed to by U upon execution of the module, in the
> > > process' own memory space.
> > >
> > > I can well imagine that formatting a disk requires some system
> > > memory as well (for buffers etc used during system call) - and
> > > this is maybe the reason it goes south for you - but the 11120
> > > bytes for format and the 11k free system RAM cannot be directly
> > > compared, right?
> > >
> > > I would be interested in knowing why format needs 11120 bytes
> > > (user memory) for doing what it does, and whether this can be
> > > reduced. But that is probably not very useful, since we can assume
> > > people should have that much of free /user/ memory when doing such
> > > tasks.
> > >
> > > The more interesting question is whether format can be made to
> > > consume less system memory. There is no F$ system memory requests
> > > in the source, only innocent I/O calls from what I can see.
> > >
> > > Off-topic question: Why is allocation bit map routines (F$AllBit
> > > and friends) system calls at all? They only operate on user
> > > memory, right?
> > >
> > > BTW, I just tried out format on my Level1 Dragon formatting a
> > > DriveWire drive, and it worked fine. It is the exact same binary
> > > as on Level2 systems (6809 and 6309 versions are identical too,
> > > CRC 0ABD19 in 3.3.0).
> > >
> > > Regards,
> > > Tormod
> >
> > Those are questions I may not have a qualified answer for until I
> > can get rid of my startup file being locked forever, Tormod.  I wish
> > I did, thats for sure.
> >
> > Cheers, Gene Heskett
>
> Gene:
>
>     If you hold the space bar at boot, startup will not be run.
>
>
I'll give that a try tomorrow Christopher, thanks.  I get the impression 
from other things it is doing, that I need to do some card edge 
cleaning.

At one point tonight, I was looking at the extended basic prompt, the 
disk controller had disappeared.  Its been sitting for a good 10 months, 
powered down. I may need to twiddle that PSU too, its a 20 yo boat 
anchor from an early XT that had I scrapped 20 some years ago from the 
tv station, who were replacing them with some off brand stuff with a 150 
MHZ cpu in them.  Genuine speed demons, at the time.  But those old XT 
psu's were built like a tank.  I'd druther consider some dried out caps 
as they can make it cold blooded too. If I can get a dry floor under it, 
I'll drag in my new 1GHz digital scope & see what I can see.

I had 2 30 meter USB cables hooking up drivewire and the printer on that 
desk to the cups system on this machine, but when I stuffed them back 
thru a hole in the floor and plugged them in, but were spamming the log, 
steadily at about 10k a minute.  So I drug out a newer cable and plugged 
it in, and thats working again, using the ehci driver this time, not the 
older 12 Mhz ohci driver.  That should help too once I get it running 
stable again.  A 4 port hub on the coco's desk lets one cable do it all.

The old ones have had their share of EMP insults as the basement isn't 
powered from this room which has been lightning proofed & UPS'd.  Too 
bad we can't buy a USB cable thats actually optical fiber and locally 
powered on each end.  Without any copper in the cable, that would put a 
stop to a heck of a lot of that.

OTOH, I haven't looked for such a critter either.

So anyway, dw is working.  And I need to check the psu and clean some 
connectors.  And I still haven't found my round tuit.

> Christopher R. Hawks
> HAWKSoft
> --
> If a straight line fit is required, obtain only two data points.
> ----------------------------------------
>        \   ^__^
>         \  (oo)\_______
>            (__)\       )\/\
>
>                ||----w |


Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author)
Genes Web page <http://geneslinuxbox.net:6309/gene>