[comp.os.vms] DIRECT control of VAXstation3000 display

milo@ndmath.UUCP (Greg Corson) (08/18/89)

I'm wondering how difficult it would be to take a VAXstation 3000 computer
and set it up so it booted VMS using a serial terminal.  Then allowed a
user-written program to COMPLETELY take over control of the display.

What I'm talking about here is writing an application program that directly
manipulates the display by either writing to the frame buffer memory or
sending commands straight into the Dragon graphics chip.

I need to go direct to the display because this particular application needs
the highest possible graphics performance.  The screen is going to be updated
very rapidly, at least several times a second.  Obviously, this is a custom
application...so I don't mind breaking all the rules to get it to work.

A few questions...

1. Is it possible to do this?

2. Could it possiblly be done under VAX ELN instead of VMS (and is there an
   "RT" version of the VAXstation 3000)

3. Is good documentation available from DEC on how to send commands directly
   to the Dragon chip?

4. Does the display hardware of the 3000 allow any form of "page flipping"?
   ie: having two frame buffers, one visible and one invisible...then flip
   the display back and forth between them.

Thanks for the information!


Greg Corson
19141 Summers Drive
South Bend, IN 46637
(219) 277-5306 
{pur-ee,rutgers,uunet}!iuvax!ndmath!milo