cs4e3bb@maccs.UUCP (Ray Wong) (01/16/87)
I have a few questions regarding GEM on the Atari that I hope
someone on this net may be able to answer. (i.e. An urgent appeal for
help )
1) Normally when we wish to write to the screen with VDI, we
are told that the physical workstation has already been opened
by the DESKTOP application, so we must open a virtual workstation
instead.
What I wanted to know is this, a boot time, when the AUTO folder
is running, VDI and AES, are not initialized, if I wanted to
create an application program which uses VDI and AES, can I
initialize them myself by issuing an open physicalworkstation
and applinit() functions???
2) My second question deals with the DOS, when you format a disk
using the DESKTOP format, is a boot sector created???
If it is, I can't seem to find it!!!
The Abacus Books say it should be at side 0, sector 1, track0
but when I use a sector editor, that sector certainly does
not look like what the boot sector should be!!
Any help on the above questions would be greatly appreciated!!
====> Ray Wong <====apratt@atari.UUCP (Allan Pratt) (01/19/87)
in article <373@maccs.UUCP>, cs4e3bb@maccs.UUCP (Ray Wong) says: > > > I have a few questions regarding GEM on the Atari that I hope > someone on this net may be able to answer. (i.e. An urgent appeal for > help ) > > > 1) Normally when we wish to write to the screen with VDI, we > are told that the physical workstation has already been opened > by the DESKTOP application, so we must open a virtual workstation > instead. > What I wanted to know is this, a boot time, when the AUTO folder > is running, VDI and AES, are not initialized, if I wanted to > create an application program which uses VDI and AES, can I > initialize them myself by issuing an open physicalworkstation > and applinit() functions??? No. The AES is not completely initialized, and it must be for these and other functions to work. Sorry. The best way I have heard of to make a GEM program autoboot is to "record" a sequence of mouse movements and clicks, SAVE DESKTOP to make sure the right things are on the right places on the screen, and "play back" the recorded sequence from an accessory after waiting about ten seconds. This is a quick overview of the procedure: I can give more details later (but they have already appeared in this newsgroup). > 2) My second question deals with the DOS, when you format a disk > using the DESKTOP format, is a boot sector created??? > If it is, I can't seem to find it!!! > The Abacus Books say it should be at side 0, sector 1, track0 > but when I use a sector editor, that sector certainly does > not look like what the boot sector should be!! > When you format a disk, you do NOT get a boot sector. Boot sectors are only necessary for RAM-loaded systems and some other things (like booting off the hard disk). When TOS detects a non-boot-sector on your floppy, it goes ahead and boots itself, then looks for the AUTO folder, accessories, etc. This is NOT the same as CP/M or MS-DOS disks, where the disk you insert at power-up has to have a boot sector. /----------------------------------------------\ | Opinions expressed above do not necessarily | -- Allan Pratt, Atari Corp. | reflect those of Atari Corp. or anyone else. | ...lll-lcc!atari!apratt \----------------------------------------------/