Re: [N8VEM-S100:1270] Re: S-100 Console IO PCBs reordered!

["Douglas W. Goodall" <douglas...@mac.com>]

Best of luck with that. Let me know if you want to chat about screen management.

Douglas


On 1/5/2013 8:35 PM, yoda wrote:

Actually the way I plan to do it is maintaining two screen pointers in the the propeller and with a special key sequence swap the pointers.  This is all dependent on there being enough hub memory to do this.  With a standard 80 x 25 line you only need 2K for each screen buffer (4K with attributes) so you only need 8K total.  With 100 x 60 will need 24 K which would be a lot tighter.

Dave 

On Saturday, January 5, 2013 10:08:15 PM UTC-6, douglas_goodall wrote:

Dave,

There are several ways of supporting the virtual terminals.

One way is to keep complete screen buffers in the console card by whatever means.

Another is to query the screen for its contents when switching it out so the host can save it until
it is switched back in, at which time it can be refreshed. That would require some tricky stuff
on the host side, but it is not impossible. If you assume the host is not in an application but rather
at the command line, the program that causes the switch can query the screen contents and save
it in a file. Then when  the host is re-activated, it can refresh the screen if the buffer file is present.

There would have to be specific code for each operating system, and the console card would have to
support a sequence that would allow the host to query the screen's state.

This is very doable.

Douglas Goodall




On 1/5/2013 6:54 PM, John Monahan wrote:

Probably is fluff Dave, but sometimes helps with hardware problems.

John

 

 

John Monahan Ph.D

e-mail: mon...@vitasoft.org

Text:    mon...@txt.att.net

 

 

From: n8ve...@googlegroups.com [mailto:n....@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of yoda
Sent: Saturday, January 05, 2013 5:56 PM
To: n8ve...@googlegroups.com
Cc: mon...@vitasoft.org
Subject: Re: [N8VEM-S100:1267] Re: S-100 Console IO PCBs reordered!

 

Hi John

 

I don't really see the purpose of displaying the codes on the hex display - seems like extra fluff - what I would like to do is eventually support virtual terminals.   I think it is possible though I don't know if there is enough hub space with the that many characters so when you change CPUs like from Z80 to 68K you retain your original screen display - it is tricky but I think doable - I had contemplated that a while back.  Actually PASM is not all that hard - it is quite elegant writing code that is deterministic without interrupts.

 

Dave

On Saturday, January 5, 2013 7:10:01 PM UTC-6, monahanz wrote:

Dave It would be truly great to modify the Propeller card for higher resolution. The chip is well able to do this. (Probably spends 99% of its time doing nothing!).  I have not been able to do this. I looked at the  examples listed in the Parallax web site, they are written in assembly language and generally above my pay grade! It will take somebody fairly well  versed in assembly to pull it off.  Dare I say not for a beginner like me.

 

While you are at it, perhaps you could also add code to display the incoming IBM keyboard HEX scan codes. The idea was originally the display scan code and ASCII code side by side on both displays.

 

John

 

 

John Monahan Ph.D

e-mail: mon...@vitasoft.org

Text:    mon...@txt.att.net

 

 

From: n8ve...@googlegroups.com [mailto:n8vem...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of yoda
Sent: Saturday, January 05, 2013 2:58 PM
To: n8ve...@googlegroups.com
Subject: [N8VEM-S100:1265] Re: S-100 Console IO PCBs reordered!

 

Hi Andrew !!

 

Did you order any extra Console I/O boards - I see I am down for 1 but would take 2 if available - it will motivate me to re-write the propeller code for it to support 100 x 60 character support and add full color support - the code should be usable by the propIO as well to give us better terminal support.   I have been meaning to do this for a while - seem to be focusing on the S100 side more now than the N8VEM side.

 

Dave

On Saturday, January 5, 2013 9:16:38 AM UTC-6, lynchaj wrote:

Yay!  Today I reordered the S-100 Console IO PCBs.  These are respin boards with some additional features and improvements over the original.  Not quite enough for a V2 but still quite a bit better.

 

The S-100 Console IO PCBs should arrive on or about 25 Jan 2013. 

 

Being able to reorder some more S-100 boards is really good news because it means the backlog of PCBs is finally starting to clear and we can get on with more new orders and reorders.

 

My goal is to speed up the reorder/order cycle and get things moving more quickly.  Next reorder will be the S-100 Regular Prototyping board PCBs which should happen soon.

 

Also I am thinking in terms of doing a pair of new orders probably in January to get the S-100 68K and S-100 80286 CPU board PCBs going as well.  Those have been in the trace route optimizer for many months and I think that’s probably good enough even if they don’t run to 100% solution.

 

This is an exciting time!  Thanks and have a nice day!

Andrew Lynch

 

PS, if you are considering an S-100 80286 CPU board PCB please let me know and I will add you to the waiting list.