ACB.TYM@OFFICE-2.ARPA (07/18/84)
As a new owner of the Little board, I must comment about ZCPR3. What is distributed by AMPRO should not be called ZCPR3 because none of the utilities are there. What is there looks like ZCPR with the addition of multicommands per line. I have the ZCPR3 documentation (10 messages on the net) and was excited to try ZCPR3 only to find out that it wasn't there. The BIOS is modified and there is even a MOVCPM with ZCPR3 in it! but there ain't none of the other stuff.
RCONN@Simtel20.ARPA (08/01/84)
From: Richard Conn <RCONN@Simtel20.ARPA> You are partly right and partly wrong. You are wrong in that the CP is really the ZCPR3 CP. Yes, that is absolutely true. All ZCPR3 features are supportable with it. You are right in that they (Ampro) are not [yet] sending out the ZCPR3 SYSTEM, with all of the utilities. I recommend that you contact Ampro directly and complain. One disk with the 58 COM files will give you what you want, and Echelon has already sent me all 14 distribution disks in Ampro format. Ampro is eager to please its customers and get a good rep (note that you can buy their BIOS and sources to ALL their system-specific utilities for $49!). What they have had trouble with (and I can't blame them because full doc isn't out yet) is grasping the scope of ZCPR3. EONs ago (EON = more than 2 months) when we first established relations, Ampro had known of me thru ZCPR2 and was explicitly after FRIENDLY. We contracted for FRIENDLY, and, at that time, ZCPR2+ was in use by me. No one will ever see ZCPR2+ because it lived for only a few months until I completed the first ZCPR3. Anyway, ZCPR2+ had shells which made FRIENDLY work. As ZCPR3 developed, I did not want to have to support ZCPR2+, so we agreed that Ampro would go to ZCPR3, but, again, their mind set was on getting FRIENDLY, NOT ZCPR3. Anyway, to make a long story short, as the ZCPR3 CP finalized, I sent them four versions of ZCPR3 for the Ampro Little Board. They ranged from the minimum system thru a full-featured system with everything turned on. A secure system was even included. Still thinking of FRIENDLY, they elected to provide the minimum system. It gave the users the max TPA possible and supported the major ZCPR3 features sans RCPs, FCPs, etc. The external command line, shells, (I think) named dirs, messages, and registers were in there. This is probably what you have. Now that more doc is coming out, Ampro is finding out more about what ZCPR3 is. Evidently they still have not changed their original approach (again, I don't blame them since they had thousands of disks preconfigured and it would cost lots to change), but if you call them (and other Ampro users like you call them) and tell them that you want a full-featured ZCPR3, I have a hunch that they will comply. They already have it ... it is just a matter of setting up the disks. If enough people ask, they may start sending out full systems as standard. Some will want the full system, others will be very applications oriented and want the min system. Another note: early versions of the Ampro had an error in the BIOS. If a file was opened, a long delay occurred (long enough to let the drives stop), and then a write occurred, the disk was trashed. This shows itself when PIP runs to concatenate two large files usually. This has definitely been fixed, but test it and see if yours does it. If it does, you need the new BIOS also. Ampro is an excellent company. I really like dealing with them. Remember that they are learning about ZCPR3 like the rest of us (myself included, since I just discovered something really wonderful about it this morning ... more on this later), and, since they already have the rights to include ZCPR3 and they want to please their customers, if enough of you bother them with requests for the rest of the software, they may start including it naturally. Their only additional overhead is the extra disk and copying for it. I can't speak for them, and they may have a different perspective on this than I, but it would be worth your time to call them and ask. Finally, note also that the release of ZCPR3 is not complete. Phase 2 is coming, and, if you liked Phase 1 ... Phase 2 will open so many doors you won't know where to start. I am starting to boggle here at all of the possiblities and HAVE to decide when to stop with Phase 2 soon. Completeness is the key ... and I don't want to leave anything out. The book will be current thru the entire release, including phase 2. It is only two utilities behind right now. Enjoy! Rick