good@atari.UUCP (Roy Good) (05/28/88)
BETA RELEASE OF NEW TOS AND HD UTILITIES FOR ST/MEGA THIS IS *NOT* A SOLICITATION FOR BETA TEST SITES! IT IS THE FULFILMENT OF AN EARLIER PROMISE TO PUBLISH THE STATUS OF THE NEW PRODUCTS. The Beta shipments of the new ST/Mega TOS went out to Atari subsidiaries this week. Some have even arrived already. Beta versions of the new Hard Disk utilities and a disk "cache" program were included. The entire kit consisted of the following: TOS ROM set, configured for local keyboard and American text. Diskette (D/S) containing: RAM loadable image of TOS, same configuration as ROM Disk cache program "CACHExxx" HDX Hard Disk utility, HINSTALL and associated programs Product Tracking System front-end program "SPRgen" Release Notes for: TOS CACHExxx HDX, HINSTALL etc (modified to 30/60MB hard disks) Draft User Manual for HDX, HINSTALL etc. User guide for Product Tracking System Various programs, files and tools to assist in translation Each subsidiary has been invited to select a small set of Beta sites, and has been requested to ensure that each such site accepts, in writing, certain terms and conditions, including: no copies to be made products and documentation are prerelease and without warranty all communications are to be made solely to the Atari subsidiary, and not through public channels all copies and documentation to be returned to Atari subsidiary on demand weekly report indicating name(s) of tester(s), tests performed, observations to be filed with Atari subsidiary each Friday any bug reports to be first verified against the currently released hardware/firmware, to ensure problem is with new TOS We want to know what works as well as what doesn't work. A report of "no problems" is worthless if it is not accompanied by an explanation of what testing has been performed. If a program fails, it is critical that it be tested with other RELEASED configurations, so that it is very clear whether or not the failure is attributable solely to the new TOS. In our testing we have found MANY ill-behaved programs which fail because they appear to access beyond the Mega 4's 4MB RAM limit. I believe they are accessing "just beyond" where they are supposed to, and it's only on the Mega 4 where they run out of physical address space rather than physical memory. Almost all programs which fail this way have been retested on the current TOS and fail in a similar way. This beta release is not the final one. Programs should not be modified to look for the date encoded in this version. PLEASE DO *NOT* CONTACT ANYONE IN ATARI R&D TO SUPPORT THIS BETA TEST. ALL ENQUIRIES SHOULD BE DIRECTED TO THE TECHNICAL MANAGER OF THE APPROPRIATE ATARI SUBSIDIARY, OR TO JOE FERRARI (408-745-2010) IN THE USA. The R&D group must now address the port of TOS to revised and new hardware platforms, and so I would appreciate your NOT disrupting the development activity. We have support groups in place, and they MUST be your first line of support if development of new products is to continue at optimum speed. A summary of the major improvements to TOS follows: Floppy formatting is "more compatible" with IBM-PC format A file may be moved (i.e. copy/delete) in one operation File Copy/Delete/Move can be interrupted with "undo" GEM programs can be autobooted from disk If a name conflict occurs during a file copy, Copy/Skip/Quit are allowed A folder may be renamed via "Show Info" The static file allocation limit of 400 is removed; limited now by free memory "Show/Print File" are completely rewritten File copying on a single floppy system uses all available memory for buffers "wind_update(FALSE)" is set when recovering from an application crash All date separators are now "/" File Selector has had major rework: 16 drive buttons Application can send a "title" string to FSEL FSEL now takes first <RETURN> on pathname edit as end-of-edit FSEL remembers where it was in a file list Static file allocation of 100 files is removed Long pathnames and "ABORT/CONTINUE" now handled correctly Preserves current DTA buffer addresses, clip rectangles and default directories New bindings available "appl_init" returns version 0130 in global(0) Editable fields may now be followed by non-editable characters in dialog boxes "wind_get()" with field parameter WF_SCREEN returns address/length of AES menu/alert buffer "Ptsin" (VDI) allows 512 vertices (true since 4/22/87) "vqt_extent": Pixel errors on some 270 degree rotations are fixed "vq_mouse" reliability enhanced 40-folder bug alleviated to the point of improbability. A folder only takes up space when "active". Limited now by depth of folders and the accumulated depth of open files. FOLDRxxx still available. "Malloc" restriction of 20 blocks/process lifted. FAT searching code for floppy and hard-disk is MUCH faster Sector buffering greatly improved, and "CACHExxx" allows expansion "Frename" can now rename a folder Archive bit (0x20) fully supported Time stamps for "." and ".." are now correct "Fsettime/Fsetdate" match BIOS and GEMDOS values "Fdatime" input value byteswap fixed Major improvements to "Ccon*" and redirection in general OS Pool reduced to same size as 11/20/85 ROMs (pre Mega). This may allow some programs which fail on Mega ROMs to work again. Soft Reset available from Keyboard if using standard keyboard handler. Soft reset by CTRL/ALT/DEL Cold Boot clears all available memory (CTRL/ALT/right SHFT/DEL) "Rsconf(-2,-1,-1,-1,-1,-1) returns last baud rate value set by Rsconf Structure of the reserved part of DTA has changed, and remains reserved Improvements made to detection of media change THE ABOVE IS A SUBSET OF THE ENHANCEMENTS MADE. THERE ARE MANY MORE, FULLY DOCUMENTED IN THE RELEASE NOTES SENT TO EACH SUBSIDIARY. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Roy J. Good Product Development, Atari Corporation Views expressed are my own. Atari may agree or disagree; they have the right. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
neil@cs.hw.ac.uk (Neil Forsyth) (05/30/88)
In article <1065@atari.UUCP> good@atari.UUCP (Roy Good) described the new
TOS ROMs.
The upper case warnings fairly blew my hair back. These new ROMs sound
brilliant. This is what we've been waiting for! Keep up the good work.
Any rough estimate as to when they are likely to be generally availiable?
(Some nice cool water after all those flames :-)
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Neil Forsyth JANET: neil@uk.ac.hw.cs
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Edinburgh
Scotland
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------hase@netmbx.UUCP (Hartmut Semken) (06/01/88)
In article <1065@atari.UUCP> good@atari.UUCP (Roy Good) writes: > BETA RELEASE OF NEW TOS AND HD UTILITIES FOR ST/MEGA [...] >THE ABOVE IS A SUBSET OF THE ENHANCEMENTS MADE. THERE ARE MANY MORE, FULLY >DOCUMENTED IN THE RELEASE NOTES SENT TO EACH SUBSIDIARY. Wow! Wow!! Wow!!! Now add MicroRTX to the Roms... (No. I'm never happy!) WOW! hase -- Hartmut Semken, Lupsteiner Weg 67, 1000 Berlin 37 hase@netmbx.UUCP I think, you may be right in what I think you're thinking. (Douglas Adams)
greg@bilbo (Greg Wageman) (06/03/88)
Congratulations. I'm tempted to say "It's about time", but I won't because that would spoil the intented positive tone of this letter. This is *exactly* the sort of evidence I was looking for from Atari to indicate that there is in fact something real in the way of support for existing machines. It sounds like Atari has taken to heart the complaints and suggestions of its customers, and done something really significant with them. I am looking forward to getting this new version of TOS into my machine. On that subject, Roy, do you know what the timetable is predicted to be for the end of beta test to release, and how this will be released to current owners? This information will be important to many people in order to decide whether to start new projects now, and possibly have to make changes later, or simply wait until the update is in hand. Congratulations again, and keep it up! Greg Wageman ARPA: greg%sentry@spar.slb.com Schlumberger Technologies BIX: gwage 1601 Technology Drive CIS: 74016,352 San Jose, CA 95110 GEnie: GWAGEMAN (408) 437-5198 UUCP: ...!decwrl!spar!sentry!greg ------------------ The opinions expressed herein are solely the responsibility of the author.
rosenkra@Alliant.COM (Bill Rosenkranz) (06/04/88)
--- our mail host was down part of last weekend and i missed this (obviously) important article...could someone PLEASE email the article to me at: ...!rutgers!mit-eddie!alliant!rosenkra thanx a priori -bill