rfpfeifle@violet.waterloo.edu (Ron Pfeifle) (12/30/87)
I've seen alot of flames about the registered developer kits. But I don't even really know what's in them. Would someone out there who knows please enlighten me (us) as what exactly are the contents of a "registered developer's kit"? (Just the facts, ma'am) Ron
ftw@datacube.UUCP (12/31/87)
Sorry, guys. My system doesn't know how to route to "violet". FTW ----- Unsent message follows ----- Received: by datacube.COM (5.52/UUCP-Project/rel-1.0/12-12-86) id AA16614; Thu, 31 Dec 87 09:49:00 EST Date: Thu, 31 Dec 87 09:49:00 EST From: ftw (Farrell Woods) Message-Id: <8712311449.AA16614@datacube.COM> To: rfpfeifle@violet.UUCP Subject: Developers Kit Originally, the Developer's Kit was a $300 package that contained five diskettes and a small mountain of generally useful but sometimes spotty documentation. The disks contained the Alcyon/DRI C compiler for the 68K, originally written for CP/M, and sorta ported to the TOS environment. It also has additional libraries that hook into GEM and all that. You also get the MicroEmacs editor, a resource editor, and a bunch of odd tools to support the compiler. The docs were for: GEM, VDI, The C compiler, the "line-A" functions, hardware (including poop sheets for most of the big common chips), old 520 ST schematics, etc. A good, solid three binders worth. You also got a "non-disclosure" agreement to sign and return to Atari. You must sign and return the agreement, along with a recipt for the kit, to Cindy Claveran at Atari to become a "registered developer". From what I have heard on the net, Atari has un-bundled the kit. You can now purchase the "support" part of the kit for about $100. This part is what would entitle you to access the Developers sig on Compu$erve, buy the "blitter ROMs" from Atari, etc. Farrell
rwa@auvax.UUCP (Ross Alexander) (01/01/88)
In article <4462@watdragon.waterloo.edu>, rfpfeifle@violet.waterloo.edu (Ron Pfeifle) writes: > I've seen alot of flames about the registered developer kits. But I don't > even really know what's in them. > Would someone out there who knows please enlighten me (us) as what exactly > are the contents of a "registered developer's kit"? > (Just the facts, ma'am) > Ron OK. We (Athabasca University Computing Services) got our kit sometime in September or October of 1986. I cannot speak for later Developer's Kits than that. Honestly, I can only say that it was better than the doc's I got from DRI when I first got CP/M - you old CP/M hackers out there can go from there ;-) For the rest of you, I can only say that reading and using the docs supplied was a little like playing Adventure - except that it's a lot slower and more frustrating. If some kind soul hadn't posted the "Proffesional GEM" (by Tim Oren) stuff to the net, and if I hadn't gone out and bought the MWC package, I don't think we would have ever done anything interesting with our 1040's. Sigh. To start, there is a very large stack of paper, perhaps 5 or so inches thick (8.5" x 11" paper, double sided xerographic copies). I have it in three two-inch ring binders, and they are _full_. The quality of the reproduction is a little disappointing, but readable; the only frustration is that occasionally the copies are skewed so that some text falls off the edge of the page. This is not too much of a problem. Volume 1: (about 580 pages) a nondisclosure agreement some waffle about 'please write portable code in case we decide to fool around with the hardware specs'. some blank SPR (bugreport) forms. If I had used these things, I would have needed 20 times as many as are supplied. keycode table errata list writeup on the ACSI buss (interface & protocol) [hard disk port] + listing of (23Jul85) hard disk driver as example of ACSI stuff. Introduction to Gem Programming (DRI): this is the IBM version, it does not exactly conform to the supplied software. Pretty obscure in places, but valuable to the initiated. GEM Programmer's Guide - Vol 1, VDI (DRI): a description of the low-level graphics primitives in _excruciating_ detail, plus a little bit about the non-existant GDOS, and some very useful info on font files. This is a reference work, very few examples of actual use. It is pretty complete, but again more useful to the initiated than the novice. GEM Programmer's Guide - Vol 2, AES (DRI): a description of the higher level stuff in GEM, such as the window and event libraries, menus, manipulation of icons, et c., et c. Again, a reference document. Lots of info if you know what you're looking for, but not a tutorial at all. Volume 2: (about 400 pages) GEM DOS 1.0 specs (DRI): calling conventions & stuff. Readable, useful. Includes C bindings. Hitchhiker's Guide to the BIOS: for a change, a really pleasant piece of doc on the BIOS - has a few errors, and can get a little self-indulgent (and obscure), but still a solid source of info on the low-level stuff. Lots of neat stuff on how booting is performed, & c. Line-A Technical Reference Manual: detailed discussion of the bit blt code, parameters, & how to call it. rather confusing organization, and again the attempts at humour can be irritating on the 500th reading. Not for the faint of heart. Intelligent Keyboard (IKBD) Protocol: really good writeup of how the mouse, joystick, and keyboard work. I wish _all_ the docs were this good. BIOS listing: a listing of the ST's BIOS. I sure wish this had been the listing output by the assembler, as it is there is no symbol table or hex listing, so it's a pain to follow the code around. But handy when you have to know _exactly_ how something works. Volume 3: (about 600 pages) DRI 'C' Language Programming Guide for CP/M 68K: this is the doc for the (in)famous Alcyon C. Ugh, blech, ack phfft! I cannot say anything good about the thing. DRI CP/M 68K Operating System Programmer's Guide: this is the most useless thing you could imagine. It has nothing to do with TOS at all. The only good thing is that it explains a few things about SID, the linker, and the assembler. Otherwise it only confuses anyone who doesn't realize it has nothing to do with using the ST. Kermit User's Guide, Fourth Edition: I never used this & have no intention of ever using it. We have ZMODEM :-). But it looks well enough written. Engineering Hardware Specification of the Atari ST Computer System: A good quick overview of the ST. Terse and pithy. Western Digital WD1770/1772 5-1/4" Floppy Disk Controller/Formatter: This is a typical engineering component data-book sort of description; very, very complete and includes examples of anything you would need to know, and a lot of stuff you don't need to know (like pinouts). Aimed at engineers. MIDI Specification 1.0: Now this is a real prize. It's exactly one page long, and says 'for more information, please contact...' and gives the address of the IMA. Really! Somebody was working overtime on this, I'm sure. (Untitled): long, unreadable & boring description of the STC504 and SMM804 printers. Typical Japanese-style (no racial slurs intended) printer manual organization of jillions of tables, everything cross referenced to something on another page. NO examples. (Untitled): etch masks and schematics for building ROM cartridges, plus mechanical drawing of connectors. OK, I guess; my ex-wife, who does this sort of thing for a living, wasn't very impressed. Me, I do software :-) United Technologies/Mostek MK68901 Multi-function Peripheral: Just like the WD1772 writeup. More stuff than you ever wanted to know, or thought possible. Schematic Diagram: a schematic for a 520ST. two 14" x 11" sheets, hard to read, and not the best organization. Still, it's enough to figure out things like 'which bit in the 68901 do I fiddle to assert DTR on the serial port' and that sort of thing. -- And that brings us to the end of the stack of paper. In summary, there's a whole lot of information here, but d*mned little guidance. It really needs something like the "Proffesional GEM" series to get the newcomer started - as it is you're so busy reading about every leaf on every tree you have no idea at all what the forest looks like ;-) ! Also, there's no master index. Some of the separate documents are indexed, but you have to know which one to look in first, which means plowing through all 1600 pages at least once. You can bet that takes some time... "And now, Ladees and Gennelmun, in the center ring! It boots, and who knows, maybe you can even do developement with it! (I sure had a h*ll of a time, though.) The amaaazing Atari Developer's Software Toolkit!" This sorry collection comes on 5 single-sided flops. I hereby list them: Flop 1 - C Compiler, Assembler, and .H files The dreaded Alcyon C compiler. At the risk of redundancy, let me restate my earlier comments: Ack phfft!! The poorest commercial C compiler you ever met. Generates assembly output, useful for deciding what kind of bugs it has introduced into your code this time around... Slow, buggy, and not even full K&R much less ANSI. Daryl (the other hacker in this shop) struggled with it for about 3 months and even got some stuff to work :-) but I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole. Flop 2 - Linker, Libraries, Thing to make Linker output executable An amazingly slow linker. Libraries with some *nasty* bugs in them. And a hack to get CP/M 68K executables to run under TOS. Gag me with a spoon... Flop 3 - Utilities: Debugger, Kermit, and some C runtime environment asm code I sort of like SID, probably because I used it under CP/M so much. We never did use the supplied KERMIT. The other stuff was ok, but pretty ho-hum; no RAMdisk or anything remotely useful like that. The APSKEL.C (application skeleton - sort of a 'hello world' for GEM) was a good thing, although I think that programmer should be shot; his style makes my teeth ache. Flop 4 - Icon Editors and Resource Construction Set, plus Doodle C source Again, having source code as an example is a really fine thing. The only problem is that since it's designed to compile under Alcyon, you spend most of your time wondering "now why is he doing that?" instead of seeing "oh, so that's how you do <arbitrary GEMish thing>". The RCS is useful and pretty completely undocumented (there are a few hints in 'Introduction to GEM Programming' (Vol 1), but nothing like a real write up anywhere). To an experienced GEM hacker, of course, it's all pretty obvious. Took me a long time. Of the two supplied icon editors, only one is useful (the other is just too primitive), and even it has a few annoying bugs - I could never get it to save both an icon and it's mask in one file... but maybe that's me & not it. Bets, anyone? Flop 5 - Emacs, various source and a doc file Well, lessee - Doodle (again), a demo of how to use the forms library, a copy of a very early Mark Williams Co. emacs, and a tutorial doc on how to read/write floppies by directly twiddling the WD1772 (which, by the way, appears in printed form in the pile of paper...). The emacs I considered a great thing, since I use it on Un*x all the time (I'm in it now, as a matter of fact). The rest is nice to have, although my criticism of impenetrable Alcyon style still holds. To bad they didn't give source for the emacs, though. -- And that's it. There's no shell supplied, instead they have an incredibly klugey 'batch processor' to invoke the various & sundry programmes required to do anything interesting like, say, getting a compile-and-link done. No RAMdisk to help speed things up. The real prizes are the ICED icon editor, the RCS, and the emacs. The Alcyon C compiler, the assembler, linker, and libraries are a disaster. The debugger is ok but primitive. The source code is good but obscure because of the Alcyon bug-workarounds (or lack-of-feature workarounds). Now, having waded through all this p*ssing and moaning, what would I recommend instead? For a start, go out and get a copy of the Mark Williams C package. Not too many bugs, nice Un*x compatability libraries, ok shell & tools (you know, stuff like egrep and tail and wc), source for an emacs, pretty good (but not quite complete) GEM and VDI docs, and a RAMdisk. In all, not a bad package deal. I have hacked on it pretty heavily and like it well enough. Secondly, get a subscription to START Magazine (with the disks!). Thirdly, get ahold of the Proffesional GEM series by Tim Oren - this is a must have. I don't know about a Resource Construction Set, though; we're using DRI RCS 2.0, but maybe you can get a copy of the KUMA version. And I'm still looking for a really good icon editor. I also recommend GULAM, and the ZMODEM that was posted about 6 months ago. Or Uniterm - that's a good solid piece of freeware too. Short list of things to stay away from: any of the bloody useless Abacus Software books (except maybe vol 13, "ST Disk Drives", which is almost useful). These things are just copies of the DRI stuff, with gratuitous errors added to avoid copyright infringement :-( Any other suggestions from the other hackers out there? I want to get down off this soapbox, my feet are tired :-) -- Ross Alexander, Athabasca University, alberta!auvax!rwa
pes@ux63.bath.ac.uk (Smee) (01/08/88)
Just a not to point out that 'Atari' policy varies depending on which 'Atari' you are talking to. For example, in the UK, and when I asked, in addition to the non-disclosure agreement, they said they also required you to tell them what software you were planning to write. I backed off and went for third-party stuff at that point. The point of this is that if you want to know what is available from Atari, when, for how much, or whatever, you're best off actually contacting Atari. (If they will talk to you, at least. Atari UK *are* pretty good at *that*, but that again might be subject to regional variation.
jansen@atari.UUCP (Mark O. Jansen) (01/12/88)
in article <4462@watdragon.waterloo.edu>, (Ron Pfeifle) says: > Would someone out there who knows please enlighten me (us) as what exactly > are the contents of a "registered developer's kit"? If you're interested in a Developer's Kit, you can contact Cindy Claveran at 408-745-2568. Cindy is the kind soul who sends out the kits to new developers, etc., and can tell you exactly what's in the kit and how much it costs. Mark Jansen, Atari Corp. ...ames!atari!jansen BIX or GEnie: mjansen Any opinions expressed above do not necessarily reflect those of Atari Corporation. "Life is tough, but it's not fair."