Re: [Freedos-user] Writing articles about FreeDOS

[Dan Scott]

Nice. Work is keeping me super busy at the moment but once I have time to 
install it and give it a real try I plan on writing a post for my small corner 
of the Internet. 

Sent from my iPhone

> On Feb 21, 2022, at 7:46 PM, Jim Hall  wrote:
> 
> Thought you'd like to know: of all the articles published on
> Opensource.com in January, my recap article about FreeDOS was the #3
> most-read article.
> https://opensource.com/article/22/1/try-freedos
> 
> So if you feel motivated to write for a tech website, and wonder if
> they would be interested in a "FreeDOS" article, the answer is "Yes."
> 
> It's a great way to contribute to FreeDOS without writing code.
> 
> And now that we've released FreeDOS 1.3, this would be a great excuse
> to write an article about FreeDOS.
> 
> Just a suggestion for those who like to write.
> 
> 
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Re: [Freedos-user] Why do you use DOS

[Dan Scott]

Well I'm admittedly late to the party on this one, but I guess I'll 
chime in anyway.


I was born in '86 so by the time I started playing on computers it was 
in the Windows 95 days, and my first time actually using a computer with 
any real idea of what I was doing was on Windows 98.  By that time 
everything I needed to do was GUI based so I never really used DOS and 
the first time I ever used a command-line tool was in college with XP 
systems.


I started working in IT a couple years back and was more familiar with 
the Linux command line but I wanted to get a better feel for using it in 
Windows since that was what we used at work.  I'm also fascinated by 
older and alternative tech so I setup a VM and installed a copy of 
MS-DOS 6 and started practicing it using an old DOS guide from the early 
90's that I found on the Internet Archive.  Shortly thereafter I heard 
Jim talking about FreeDOS with Bryan Lunduke and decided to give it a go.


I primarily use it for distraction free writing (I'm boring and really 
like MS-EDIT, or whatever the built in text editor is), but I also enjoy 
the old games and exploring old programs like word processors, and the 
like.  OpenGEM is also cool.


I just wiped my old ThinkPad (T42) to install FreeDOS on actual hardware 
and look forward to getting more familiar with it.


Dan


On 4/14/2021 11:59 AM, Johnpaul Humphrey wrote:

In light of the "DOS was dead" discussion, I wanted to ask a question.
I was *born* after support was dropped for MS-DOS, so I can't claim
nostalgia as my reason for use. Recently I installed FreeDOS on my
modern HP-Pavilion laptop, alongside BSD, Linux, and plan9. I did this
because I like DOS's speed and assembly programming.
It worked fine after I fixed the beep bug with your help.
So my question is, why do YOU use FreeDOS?
Is it primarily nostalgia? Legacy program support? Speed?
Note that I don't consider running legacy software a bad reason. I was
shocked by how much good software has been "thrown away" because of
its age. On Linux all my favorite software (vi, siag office, twm,
motif &c.) was written before I was born. However, that is not my
primary reason for using FreeDOS. my primary reason is because it is
like the motorcycle of operating systems. It is lightweight, has no
red tape to cut through to do things, and is monotasking. (Monotasking
is also why I don't use it as much as I would like to, but why I use
it at all.)
I figured that if I had a different reason than what everybody
assumes, that some of you might as well. Everyone seems to assume that
DOS is used by people who are unable to cope with progress and have to
run their ancient version of word perfect. If that is your reason, it
is not a bad reason. I was thinking of eventually writing a 64-bit dos
work [sort of] alike eventually, but it would not be able to support
legacy programs due to segment offset addressing and a million other
things.


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Re: [Freedos-user] Clear your calendar!

[Dan Scott]

Awesome!  I was about to install 1.2 on an old ThinkPad I've got but I 
think I'll wait and give the RC a go.


On 4/20/2021 5:39 AM, Jerome Shidel wrote:

Clear your calendar and get ready!

FreeDOS 1.3-RC4 is only days away.

RC4 is in it’s final stage of testing and tweaking.

There are loads of changes.

Possibly more changes from RC3-RC4 than there was going from 1.2 to 1.3-RC1.

:-)

Jerome

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Re: [Freedos-user] Recovery of a file on a non booting Windows computer

[Dan Scott]

I agree that booting to a live Linux instance would be a better solution 
here.  I've had to do this many times and honestly it doesn't really 
matter what live image you use.  Mint is fine.  I personally prefer 
Ubuntu MATE or Xubuntu but it doesn't really matter.  It should give you 
access to the Windows drive through the file manager (both graphical and 
CLI).


On 4/14/2021 4:30 PM, Mercury Thirteen via Freedos-user wrote:

+1 on the Linux Mint recommendation. Out of all the Linuxi I've personally 
tried, I've found Mint to be quite user friendly and I would say it's a great 
place to start for those more familiar with a Windows-like interface.


Sent with ProtonMail Secure Email.

‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐
On Wednesday, April 14, 2021 12:43 PM, Ralf Quint  wrote:


On 4/14/2021 5:19 AM, Stephanos wrote:


Dear All
I want to boot to freeDOS using a CD ROM.  Then I want to insert a
memory stick into the computer and copy a file from the Windows HDD onto
the memory stick.  Is this possible and if so which version of freeDOS
do I use?

If you are talking about any Windows newer than Windows ME, simply
forget about this route.

Use a Linux Live CD (I personally would recommend Linux Mint 20.1 Mate)
and use that one instead...

Ralf


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Re: [Freedos-user] Which DOS is "better/best" as the underlying DOS oper. sys. for Win FW 3.1.1. in a mult-boot PC ?

[Dan Scott]

I’m not nearly as knowledgeable as the others who have responds but from what 
I’ve heard and experienced, Windows 3.11 for Workgroups works quite well with 
MS-DOS 6.22. 

Sent from my iPhone

> On Nov 1, 2020, at 7:30 PM, Karen Lewellen  wrote:
> 
> Hi there,
> Interesting question.
> Is there a reason why, if you intend running windows 3.11, that you do not 
> want to use the MS dos closely associated with that windows at the time? 5.0 
> 6.0, or 6.22?
> My guess about ms dos 7.1 is that it  draws from a much later infrastructure.
> I run that edition of DOS, but I do not use windows in any form.
> Just starting the conversation,
> Karen
> 
> 
> 
>> On Sun, 1 Nov 2020, TheBigBlue Guard wrote:
>> 
>> Hello FreeDOSers,
>> 
>> How was your Halloween ? Mine was okay... No tricks yet !
>> 
>> My Q and Problem :
>> 
>> I understand you need a DOS oper sys underlying Win For Workgroups 3.1.1 OS
>> in a mult-boot native environment (no boxes / no emulators).Which DOS
>> OS do you strongly recommend ? and why ?  I have MS-DOS 7.1 install CD and
>> was told NOT to rely on it for Win FW 3.1.1. - is this accurate and correct
>> ?  Can you use FreeDOS as the underlying  OS ?
>> 
>> Big Blue
>> 
> 
> 
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Re: [Freedos-user] New to DOS - 486

[Dan Scott]

That’s awesome everyone, thanks for the insight.  It sounds a lot more involved 
than I first expected.  I’m going to read up on what you guys are talking about 
and go from there!

> On Sep 15, 2020, at 7:05 AM, ZB  wrote:
> 
> On Tue, Sep 15, 2020 at 12:45:46PM +0200, Eric Auer wrote:
> 
>> Actually you can even find relatively modern quad core
>> computers with IDE :-) The problem is that when you want
>> DOS compatible sound hardware, you want something with
>> ISA slots and those went out of fashion 20 years ago.
> 
> Yes, that's the best choice - but if not available, then more recent mobo
> with chipset featuring DDMA ("Distributed DMA") also won't be that bad.
> 
>> There are a few PCI soundcards with limited DOS support:
>> Some come with drivers which simulate a SoundBlaster, but
>> those do not work with protected mode games, while others
>> use hardware tricks which only work on mainboard chipsets
>> which still have a bit of ISA style even while the boards
>> have no have actual ISA slots.
> 
> That "bit of ISA style" is called DDMA.
> 
> Probably the best choice among a few PCI-soundcards working under DOS will
> be Yamaha YMF-724/744.
> 
> More about this:
> https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=48553
> https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?f=46&t=48133#p497926
> -- 
> regards,
> Zbigniew
> 
> 
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Re: [Freedos-user] New to DOS

[Dan Scott]

I’ve seen video and I did play a fair number of DOS compatible games in my 
earlier years especially on Windows 95 and 98.  I’m casually looking for an old 
486 to tinker with too, so hopefully I’ll stumble upon something someone is 
looking to get rid of or a cheap one at Goodwill.

> On Aug 18, 2020, at 11:12 PM, Bryan Kilgallin  wrote:
> 
> Hi Dan:
> 
>> I grew up in the 90’s and early 00’s with Windows and then moved over to 
>> Linux in 2010, but I’ve never really used DOS before other than running 
>> pings or ipconfigs in the Windows Command Prompt.
> 
> A lot of things were different in those days. The speaker was built-in, and 
> intended just for beeps. To stop the OS, you switched-off the power. Games 
> had blocky video. It was easy to accidentally trash the installation!
> -- 
> members.iinet.net.au/~kilgallin/
> 
> 
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Re: [Freedos-user] New to DOS

[Dan Scott]

That’s awesome Jim, thanks!  I’ll check these out.

> On Aug 18, 2020, at 1:25 PM, Jim Hall  wrote:
> 
> Hi Dan - and welcome to the list!
> 
> I think the wiki is a good place to start:
> http://wiki.freedos.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page 
> <http://wiki.freedos.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page>
> 
> The "DOS Commands" list is probably a good wiki page to review:
> http://wiki.freedos.org/wiki/index.php/Dos_commands 
> <http://wiki.freedos.org/wiki/index.php/Dos_commands>
> 
> You might also want to look at the FreeDOS Help page:
> http://help.fdos.org/en/index.htm <http://help.fdos.org/en/index.htm>
> 
> And I wrote an article for OpenSource about a "Gentle Introduction to 
> FreeDOS" that might be a good place to start, especially coming from Linux:
> https://opensource.com/article/18/4/gentle-introduction-freedos 
> <https://opensource.com/article/18/4/gentle-introduction-freedos>
> 
> Also, check out some of the videos on the FreeDOS YouTube channel. I've been 
> recording videos there for the last year or so. There's a "Using FreeDOS" 
> playlist that has several videos you'll find helpful to get started:
> https://www.youtube.com/freedosproject 
> <https://www.youtube.com/freedosproject>
> 
> 
> And I'm thinking about starting a new effort to clean up our documentation 
> and make it easier to read, especially for folks who are new to FreeDOS. So 
> there's probably more to come!
> 
> Jim
> 
> On Tue, Aug 18, 2020 at 11:58 AM Dan Scott  <mailto:ogretrop...@gmail.com>> wrote:
> Hi there everyone,  this is my first time on a mailing list like this so if I 
> don’t get the etiquette right, please let me know.  I grew up in the 90’s and 
> early 00’s with Windows and then moved over to Linux in 2010, but I’ve never 
> really used DOS before other than running pings or ipconfigs in the Windows 
> Command Prompt.  I want to really learn DOS and figured FreeDOS was the place 
> to start but I don’t really know what I’m doing or how to get software and 
> such installed.  Can anyone recommend any good resources for someone brand 
> new to the platform?
> 
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[Freedos-user] New to DOS

[Dan Scott]

Hi there everyone,  this is my first time on a mailing list like this so if I 
don’t get the etiquette right, please let me know.  I grew up in the 90’s and 
early 00’s with Windows and then moved over to Linux in 2010, but I’ve never 
really used DOS before other than running pings or ipconfigs in the Windows 
Command Prompt.  I want to really learn DOS and figured FreeDOS was the place 
to start but I don’t really know what I’m doing or how to get software and such 
installed.  Can anyone recommend any good resources for someone brand new to 
the platform?

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Re: [Freedos-user] Multimedia Keyboards and Mouse Scroll Wheels

[Scott]

I am a heavy tablet user, and it has replaced a *lot* of what my laptop 
did, but not all (can't see doing code compile/debugging on it for 
example, but then neither can I see me wanting to do that with only one 
monitor anymore)
I carry a small bluetooth keyboard in my pack/briefcase and a wire-frame 
stand. When I'm in a meeting where I need to take extensive notes, I 
prop it on the stand and use the keyboard. Same for document creation. 
For most emails and such the on-tablet "keyboard" is just fine.
With my smartphone I do a lot of text entry via voice-to-text, it is 
surprisingly efficient if I'm not sitting conveniently at a desk or 
table and am not in a public space where it would bother others.


On 2/15/12 9:22 AM, Rugxulo wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 10:44 AM, dmccunney  wrote:
>> On Wed, Feb 15, 2012 at 11:19 AM, Rugxulo  wrote:
>>> P.S. The buzz is all around tablets and touchscreens these days. While
>>> I can (barely) see the point, it seems bad for things like text input.
>>> But I guess if all you're doing is browsing around or playing (very)
>>> simplistic games, it doesn't matter.
>> Think of tablets as half-duplex.  They are media consumption devices,
>> and the communication is mostly *to* the tablet.
>>
>> If you use a tablet, for the most part, you don't *do* text input.  A
>> touch screen interface is quite adequate to select media you want to
>> consume.
> Right, just to watch a movie or listen to music or read an eBook
> doesn't really need a keyboard. I get that. But you know how some
> people are, "The traditional PC is dead, long live smartphones +
> tablets!" etc. etc. I don't think it's a universal solution to what
> PCs can do.


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Re: [Freedos-user] Re : Support for 4k byte sectors

[Scott]

Links please?


On 1/25/12 1:46 PM, Bertho Grandpied wrote:
> Just a note, Folks, /who/ said "advanced" format disks (presenting 512 byte 
> sectors) are with us for ten years - or more, so we should be little 
> concerned about having to support true 4K sector disks ?
>
> But I stumbled upon a couple pages that say otherwise : "the industry" has 
> agreed to sell AF disks only *until the end of 2014*! This if true is way 
> shorter than 10 years, and would IMO justify real work done on updating the 
> kernel. I've not kept the links, ooops! but Google is our friend (is it?)
>
> By procrastinating one would be doing the same kind of costly mistake than, 
> say, for IPv6 support (lack of it).
>
> Regards
>
>


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Re: [Freedos-user] Large drives with 4k sectors presenting as 512b?

[Scott]

You may already realize this but, at least for now, all HDDs on the 
market with 4k physical sector size still report and work with 512b 
sector sizes.
Some also report extended attributes that let aware OSs know they have 
4k physical sector sizes.

Thus, they ARE backwards compatible, and the price for that is that if 
you aren't able to realize they are 4k underneath then you may get 
slower performance (5%-10%) on certain operations that "needlessly" 
cross physical sector boundaries.

And yes, you can use multiple logical 512b sectors within the physical 
4k sector for different files, so you aren't wasting space on files <4k.

Out of curiosity, what are folks generating that would make lots of 
small files? 4k is only 512 one-byte characters. Add a little metadata 
and you've not got a lot of information to work with there that would 
keep you far enough under 4k to showing meaningful waste.

My response to this post is 963 bytes worth of characters for example.

On 4/11/11 6:44 AM, Jack wrote:
> Might be simpler just to KEEP 512-byte sectors, as I am almost certain
> they could, IF their firmware-engineers were told to do so in "new" 4K
> sector disks.   Might also save them a lot of LOST business, for I bet
> a "4K and ONLY 4K" decision may cost them a lot of Windows/Linus users
> as well, not merely those of us who still use and like DOS.
>


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Re: [Freedos-user] Large drives with 4k sectors presenting as 512b?

[Scott]

On 4/10/11 3:56 PM, Jack wrote:
> A lot of Internet vendor websites, such as NewEgg, just may prove
> you wrong.   Every time I look at NewEgg and others, the "latest-
> and-greatest" hard disk has a price premium far WORSE than buying
> 2 hard disks of 1/2 the size.
Most people don't buy the latest and greatest, the thing to compare is 
the commodity disk prices, not the cutting edge.
Going with your newegg example, and picking 1 & 2TB 3.5" drives:
0.5TB - Hitachi & Seagate & WD $40, Samsung $50
1TB - Hatachi $55, Samsung $60, Seagate & WD $65
2TB - Samsung & Hitachi $80, WD & Seagate $90

>> 
>> "One estimate for 4K sector technology puts this at 100 bytes of ECC
>> data needed for a 4K sector, versus 320 (40x8) for 8 512B sectors.
>> Furthermore the larger sectors means that larger erroneous chunks of
>> data can be corrected (burst error correction), something that was
>> becoming harder as greater areal densities made it easier to wipe out
>> larger parts of a 512B sector. As a result, the need for the larger
>> sector is born."
> Absolutely UNBELIEVABLE!!   40-byte ECCs needed for 512-byte sectors??
>
>   From 1976-1978 I worked for a company that made hard-disk controllers,
> used on PDP-11 systems to control 80- to 300-MB "washing machine" size
> disk drives, all they had 35 years ago.   Our controller used a 56-bit
> ECC, i.e. 7 bytes, to detect all errors and correct bursts of up to 11
> bits.   35 years ago, PDP-11 drivers (I wrote them, too) did not have,
> and didn't need, any better error-correction than that, since the disk
> drives WORKED!   Nor (that I know of) were there "spare sectors", etc.
Maybe I'm missing something here, but... (AND BIG DISCLAIMER - I did 
quick Googling with even quicker Google calc to get the #s below, I may 
have made very significant math errors)

The earliest spinning disks had an areal density of around 2kb/sq. in, 
the current drives are around 500Gb/sq. in.
That means that the size of one bit on the earliest disks was 
262,144,000 times as large as a bit on a modern disk.
So yes, when looking at a space that is 262 Million times larger, there 
is a lot more room for error than modern disks, thus a need for much 
larger ECCs.

So, on the original spinning disk a 512b sector "consumed" 0.256 sq. in.
On the newest disks that same sector is about 9.5 × 10-10 sq inches, or 
0.024 nanometers. Given that the average virus is around 75nm, one virus 
particle sized damage to the HDD would take out over 3000 512b sectors, 
on the original disk it would have taken damage of an area equal to 
nearly 90,000 virus-particles to wipe out ONE 512b sector.

So, I don't see that the large ECC is any indication of a lower quality 
of drive, it is a natural solution to approaching the physics limitation 
of magnetic recording.





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Re: [Freedos-user] Large drives with 4k sectors presenting as 512b?

[Scott]

Consumers (home and business) for the most part buy the bulk of their 
storage on $/GB type of decisions. Buying multiple lower capacity HDDs 
does not meet this model.
The 2.5" and 3.5" form factors are such an embedded standard that making 
your drives a different size to get more platter area is not realistic.
Getting greater effective areal density means either more technology in 
the R/W heads and platter, or more efficient use of the existing space. 
Increasing the areal density through technology, while obviously a 
continuing focus of HDD companies, is getting prohibitively more 
expensive with each small advance due to real limitations of physics.
That takes us back to more efficient use of the space, and that is what 
4k sectors gets us.


"One estimate for 4K sector technology puts this at 100 bytes of ECC 
data needed for a 4K sector, versus 320 (40x8) for 8 512B sectors.  
Furthermore the larger sectors means that larger erroneous chunks of 
data can be corrected (burst error correction), something that was 
becoming harder as greater areal densities made it easier to wipe out 
larger parts of a 512B sector. As a result, the need for the larger 
sector is born."


On 4/10/11 1:59 PM, Michael B. Brutman wrote:
> The move to 4K sector sizes has very good technical reasons behind it.
> It's not the end of the world.
>


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Re: [Freedos-user] Large drives with 4k sectors presenting as 512b?

[Scott]

One of the key things I'm thinking about is, independent of total space 
on the drive, it looks like physical sector sizes larger than 512b may 
be all that is available at some point in the not too distant future. Of 
course the drives will continue to appear as 512b to OSs/apps that don't 
know how to check for the underlying physical sector size.
The problem is that there can be very significant performance penalties 
to treating a disk with physical sector sizes of 4k as if they are 512b 
due to potential read/modify/write actions needed when write operations 
cross physical sector boundaries. Reads can also see a hit if they are 
unnecessarily crossing those boundaries as well.
Making sure to partition on 4k boundaries certainly is critical, but 
does not in itself fix the underlying issue.

Not that I'm calling for a ground-up re-write of the OS, just wondering 
what people have planned when actual 512b physical sector disks become 
unavailable.


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Re: [Freedos-user] Large drives with 4k sectors presenting as 512b?

[Scott]

Thank you for the quick and informative response. It is pretty much just 
what I figured, but I had to verify first.

On 4/7/11 5:44 PM, Jack wrote:
> I am the author of the UIDE driver for DOS systems.   Eric Auer is
> away from E-Mail, for a few days, so I will reply directly to your
> thread about "Large drives with 4K sectors" --


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[Freedos-user] Large drives with 4k sectors presenting as 512b?

[Scott]

I see that the FreeDOS format command has a /A option to use 4k sector 
formatting.
Have any of the underlying I/O paths or built-in tools for 
writing/cloning/copying/etc been updated to understand the new 
generation of large drives that use 4K physical sectors but still accept 
512b interactions? (Think Western Digital Caviar Green 3TB drives).


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Re: [Freedos-user] I need an example

[Scott Mayo]

> I would recommend trying to contact the WATT-32 library for such
> examples... and there is example code on the website, although I'm not
> sure it's c++.

I wasn't clear. Code's the only thing I don't need. It's the build scripts
(.bat files, make files, whatever) and examples of how to use the
toolchain, that I'm after. If I could use Microsoft VC++ to produce a DOS
executable (and I dearly with I could, because then I'd be done), I'd be
asking for a project file, so I could see what switches the compiler
needed, what libraries to link with, etc.




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[Freedos-user] I need an example

[Scott Mayo]

I'm on the edge of buying hardware for my embedded project. I've been
holding back because I'm nervous about actually assembling the software.
Writing the software is no problem - I have my C++ & inline assembler
coded and pretty much ready to go. What I'm uncomfortable with is the
actual process of getting it compiled for DOS, linked with WATT-32, moved
to the PC-104 board, and started.

What I think I need is someone to show me a trivial C++ program that uses
WATT-32, AND the compiler setup, compiler settings, build scripts, and all
the other associated toolchain *junk* needed to get it ready to go.

In part I'm just spoiled - I've gotten used to just typing code into
Microsoft VC++, clicking build and having my executable pop out, finished
and ready. The idea of spending days stumbling though compiler settings,
memory models, config.sys and everything else is just plain daunting.

Does anyone have a build environment they'd be interested in sharing, that
I can unpack onto a WIn XP system and get running in a few hours? A
compiler installation .zip, and a .bat file that assembles and links
sample C++ code and the WATT-32 library should be all I need...





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Re: [Freedos-user] (fwd) FDXMS Sources.

[Scott Mayo]

Honestly, what's the average age on this list? Eleven?





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Re: [Freedos-user] re: QHIMEM 1.3

[Scott Mayo]

> dos=high,umb
> device=himem.exe
> stacks=0,0

stacks - those are for interrupts, right? I mske minimal use of interrupts
myself, but I don't know what the packet driver or waterloo TCP is going
to do. I do know that at least 6 interrupts can occur simultaneously (3
serial ports, ethernet traffic, timer, and my own hardware signal).

> rem see above...
> install=ne2000.com -i 0x60
> shell=yourapp.exe

OK. It's been awhile since I ran DOS. Given that I'm booting DOS out of a
flash memory device, which presumably isn't the fastest thing going, what
am I looking at for a start-up time, from power on to the loading of the
shell? I know this varies with processor speed, but if someone can tell me
"3.2 seconds from my USB thumb drive on a 1.2Ghz Pentium" I'll convert
from there.

Startup time is an issue; the lights don't come on in the room until the
app runs. :-)




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Re: [Freedos-user] QHIMEM 1.3

[Scott Mayo]

I'm getting closer to having my application ready to stick on a TS5500.

I'd like to compile it to use real mode, as that's probably simplest, and
it ought to fit easily in 640k. So my main concern is to push other stuff
into high memory, leaving low memory free for my code and data.

Where can I get a reasonably simple autoexec.bat for Freedos that will
load just the minimal things, and load things high when that's safe? I
don't need a mouse, keyboard, video, or other standard devices; it's just
A: (flash card used to hold my app), the packet driver for the ethernet
provided by the hardware, and my code.

Also, is there a way to kick the command interpreter out of memory? Once
my app runs, there is no return to the prompt - power cycle is the only
way out.



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Re: [Freedos-user] re: FreeDos a good choice for me?

[Scott Mayo]

I'd originally posted, asking if FreeDOS is right for my application.

Since I've joined the list, I've had one or two people suggest other
operating systems, and a bunch of people bickering of the ownership of
some wretched piece of software. No one has stepped up and suggested that
FreeDOS is going to do what I need. Should I take this as a hint that I'm
looking at the wrong OS?

(As for ownership, as far as I can tell, the moment you post software to
the net, you said goodbye to it. Copyright frequently notwithstanding. I
see no way anyone can change that, so for the sake of those of us who
don't care who wrote what, as long as it works, could the conversation be
taken somewhere private?)



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Re: [Freedos-user] re: FreeDos a good choice for me?

[Scott Mayo]

>> I tried compiling my code with Watcom. I got extremely strange behaviour
>> -
>> the compiler planted stack checking calls, and the stack checks were
>> *convinced* I needed vast amounts of stack space to proceed with even
>> the
>> first function call out of main(). (I make very little use of the
>> stack.)
>
> That's because OpenWatcom's default calling convention uses the stack
> to pass arguments.  To change the default calling convention to, say,
> something like __cdecl, there should be a compiler option.

No, there was something much more dire than that going on. My whole call
tree doesn't go more that 8 or 10 functions deep, and it's a rare function
that gets passed more than a pair of ints. Certainly no passing of structs
or anything large. And no large automatic varibles or arrays, either. So
maybe a few hundred words total might have been needed, but it was
claiming many thousands. And it apparently calculated the maximum
necessary depth at every point in the call tree, because it would trigger
a stack overflow on the first call out of main - which made it impossible
to figure out which function it really thought, way down the tree, needed
all the space. After a half hour of banging around, I downloaded DM, and
there were no stack problems.

> You don't need a 32-bit DOS kernel, but a 16-bit DOS kernel (like
> freedos's) and a DOS extender like cwsdpmi, dos32a, etc...

I'm hoping I don't even need the extender. Unless waterloo TCP is
ginormous, there's no reason why my code, DOS, and a packet driver
shouldn't fit in 640K.




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[Freedos-user] re: FreeDos a good choice for me?

[Scott Mayo]

>
> Hi, did you already try Linux, with your software running
> as root so that it can access all I/O ports directly?
> Or maybe RTLinux to get better "realtime" performance?

My concerns with Linux:

1) It has to have some sort of processing in the background to handle
ethernet and serial ports - and I can't see what it is doing. If it adds a
lot of overhead, I could end up with a performance problem I can't solve.
2) I'd need to write a driver to handle the interrupt I need to deal with
directly. DOS will just let me hook it at runtime and won't make a fuss
about it.
3) It's multitasking. I have one process, one thread, and it never sleeps;
why do I need a scheduler? This is a bulldozer to move a teaspoon of sand.


>
> Fiddling with serial ports directly in DOS is as complicated
> as doing the same without any OS at all, as you explicitly
> do not want to use drivers for that...

To be honest, I don't want an OS. Except for the fact that at power-on I
want my app loaded from flash and started, and that I need a framework to
run the TS5500's ethernet packet driver on, an OS is very much unwanted.

I've seen the assembler for handling a serial port. It's not so bad. My
real fear is that I will have trouble mating C++'s memory model
assumptions with the assembler's. A fear of tools, not code.

> Compiling 32bit DOS apps with GNU C++ (djgpp) is quite easy,
> but you should not expect that hooking interrupts or using
> the internet would be overly easy. In particular, the DOS
> packet driver of your network card hooks interrupts, so it
> will get in the way if you want to do real time stuff.

Right, but that's true no matter what. I must handle TCP and UDP traffic.
Whether it's DOS, Linux, or bare metal, something has to process the
traffic. My realtime requirements aren't hideously demanding, though -
there's a simple operation I *must* do 64 times a second, and some other
processing that has to finish within a 64th of a second, and I don't think
the serial or ethernet traffic will interfere with that enough to matter.
Not with a 586 at 133Mhz, anyway.

> What will be even worse is USB support. Even enabling BIOS
> support for USB keyboards (just for an example) will already
> make the system performance a lot more unsteady, as USB is
> a complex networking protocol and not meant for realtime at
> all...

But it does mean I don't end up handling 8 serial ports someday, and
running out of IRQs. I don't need this in the short term. I might never
need it at all. I just need to make sure that it's possible.

> As you said you only need 32bit INTS, you can even use a
> 16bit compiler as long as you do not need data structures
> which are more than 64k each. If you use 32bit addressing,
> for example with DJGPP or OpenWatcom,

I tried compiling my code with Watcom. I got extremely strange behaviour -
the compiler planted stack checking calls, and the stack checks were
*convinced* I needed vast amounts of stack space to proceed with even the
first function call out of main(). (I make very little use of the stack.)
I gave up and used the Digital Mars compiler, and things got a lot saner.

> So... try 32bit DOS or 32bit Linux. I doubt that you will
> have to write device drivers for the latter, there are
> many drivers available.

64 times a second, I want to increment a 16 bit integer in my
application's address space. It's about 2 instructions, and one of them
dismisses the interrupt. Linux turns that simple procedure into a song and
dance.

32bit DOS sounds right, but I read up on freeDOS-32 and it sounded like it
was not ready for prime time. Does someone have a cheap/free 32 bit DOS
with integrated TCP/UDP support?



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[Freedos-user] FreeDos a good choice for me?

[Scott Mayo]

I'm looking for an OS to run on an embedded system (a 586 based PC104)
board. What I need is pretty simple:

1) Access to ethernet, TCP and UDP. (Waterloo should do it.)
2) The ability to hook interrupts.
3) I need to be able to handle serial ports via interrupts; potentially
more than 4 ports someday. BIOS/polling will not work.
5) The ability to read and write I/O ports.
6) I need cross compilation of C++ and probably some assembler, on my
windows laptop, into a flash card that I can just run my app from, when
the board powers on.
7) 32 bit ints

I DON'T need:

1) Console/keyboard support.
2) Much over 300k of space (as far as I know. Depends on how big waterloo
networking is).
4) memory allocation, file I/O, or (I think) any DOS services, except as
needed to get my app loaded and started. There's no disk, console,
keyboard, or anything, other than serial and ethernet and I/O ports. (I
don't know if ethernet implies using DOS).
5) The ability to exit back to DOS. The only exit is reset or power fail.

I'd *LIKE* the following, though they aren't essential:

1) USB support. Someday I might need more serial ports, and if IRQs get
tight, I'd like to be able to put them all on a USB port.

And what I *really* need:

1) Help. It's been a very long time since I had to think about phases like
"mixed model" or "real" or "protected" or "extended memory", and I forget
how it all works, except for the vague recollection that it was all very,
very painful. As I'll likely be mixing C++ and assembler (for the serial
ports, probably), I'm looking for information on how to build an
executable which OS can run. What tools make sense? (I'm looking at the
Digital Mars compiler; good choice?) I'm hoping I don't need to install
extended memory drivers, but how do I tell? If anyone can suggest a good
book on this stuff, it would be a help.

Linux would be a strong contender, except I need to handle interrupts and
don't want to write device drivers. (But the built-in support for serial
and ethernet is very, very tempting). Is FreeDOS going to be a good choice
for me?

Thanks for any help.

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