Info-Mac-Request@SUMEX-AIM.STANFORD.EDU (The Moderators) (02/16/90)
Info-Mac Digest Thu, 15 Feb 90 Volume 8 : Issue 30
Today's Topics:
Answers to Mac Plus SCSI Booting Problem
casio to mac interface
Flight Simulator Status
Help interfacing mac to NTSC
Human Interface Notes
Info-Mac Digest V8 #26 (2 msgs)
Initial Color Palette
Jasmine experiences solicited
Mac+ speeds (vs. A-Max)
Mac Japanese Kanji
Mathematica
Mouse action and Timers in Supercard
White Knight/Red Ryder
Your Info-Mac Moderators are Bill Lipa, Lance Nakata, and Jon Pugh.
The Info-Mac archives are available (by using FTP, account anonymous,
any password) in the info-mac directory on sumex-aim.stanford.edu
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/info-mac/help/recent-files.txt and /info-mac/help/all-files.txt.
Please send articles and binaries to info-mac@sumex-aim.stanford.edu.
Send administrative mail to info-mac-request@sumex-aim.stanford.edu.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 16:15:50 EST
From: "LT Peter A. Nardi" (CompSci) <nardi@cad.usna.mil>
Subject: Answers to Mac Plus SCSI Booting Problem
I posted a request for help with getting a vintage 1986 Mac Plus to
boot from an external 20meg SCSI drive. As with anything else, it
turns out that there is no easy answer. Thanks to all who helped, and here
is a summary of responses:
pete nardi
nardi@cad.usna.mil
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
As documented in Tech. Note. 96, there are a number of problems with many SCSI
drives before System 4.1 and especially during the boot process. There are two
problems you may be seeing, which may or may not be easy to fix. Technical
details follow and many may want to skip the rest of this paragraph. The first
one is that many non-"Platinum" MacPlus's do a SCSI Reset in the loop looking
for valid boot volumes. This causes some drives to react with an SCSI Attn,
which the MacPlus ROM is not expecting. The fix for this is described below.
The second is the MacPlus ROM doesn't handle complex TIBs (pseudo-DMA command
lists) properly in some cases, and certainly don't do "blind" transfers
properly for most drives. This is all corrected once the system is fully
initialized. Nonetheless, as another writer recently pointed out, this type of
problem is particularly difficult to track down, since during the boot process
MacsBug doesn't handle keyboard I/O properly, if one even gets far enough to
load MacsBug. These problems require changes to the disk driver to fix, or
using another disk driver. You may be able to use the drive in the interim, if
you're lucky.
There is a two fixes to the SCSI Reset bug, one of which is clean and the other
crude but effective. The clean fix is the tell the drive not to issue the SCSI
Attn, assuming both the setup program and the drive know how to do this. The
crude fix is to suppress SCSI Reset, preferrably on the drive end of the SCSI
bus. If the drive uses 50 pin flat cable, there are commercial adapters which
you can use to switch out certain pins (locally, Fry's Electronics has them,
and other places probably do as well). If not, you can put one on the back of
the MacPlus, which suppresses SCSI Reset for the entire SCSI bus.
You can make an adapter to do this with a matching pair of DB25 (usually used
for RS232) connectors, one "short-tailed" wire-wrap and the other solder type.
Clip the offending wire-wrap pin in half (see I-M V4 for exact pin) and solder
the remaining 24 wire-wrap pins straight through to the solder socket, to make
an adapter which connects everything else except RESET. It does not matter
(obviously) which type is male and which is female, so long as you have one of
each. Attach this between MacPlus and your SCSI cable, and this will suppress
SCSI Reset entirely. The disadvantage of this is that you will probably have
to power cycle your SCSI devices if things ever got badly wedged (unlikely if
your configuration is simple). The mechanically inclined may want put a box
around the adapter and add a momentary contact switch to allow RESET to go
through selectively, so as to avoid power cycling (bad for disks), if this
becomes a problem.
As mentioned before, you'll need to change your SCSI driver if that doesn't fix
it, as it is probably not checking ROM version and/or doing too complex an
operation too early. You may have to go to another driver. I'm not familiar
with it, but SF&I has been around long enough that it probably does the right
thing. Others may as well. Meanwhile, as you have observed, you can often
boot from another drive, as then patches to the SCSI calls are been loaded.
I booted from floppy for a month or so until i was able to fix my problems, so
you do have that option. Make a System Folder with all your INITs, etc., but
minimal fonts, and running almost anything off the hard disk will switch to
the hard disk system, with a full set of fonts and desk accessories.
One of the few things i agree with Bo3b about, (at least on a MacPlus) if you
are not technically inclined and don't have time to mess around for awhile, you
should probably use a commercial product, or at least have someone who suitably
knowledgable do the initial setup for you. You will probably also get good
backup and partitioning software as well that well. But if you are a hacker
[in the traditional rather than media sense], it can be satisfying to do your
own work, particularly if you can change things to suit your individual
situation. Good luck whatever route you choose.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I don't know enough about this to be authoritative, but here is one
possibility: some older Plus'es came with buggy ROMs which caused
boot problems with some SCSI drives. Among those drives, some could
be reconfigured via software (suitable formatting) - which circumvents
the problem, and some are simply not usable with the older ROMs. To
determine your ROM version, either get MacEnvy (an amusing and sometimes
useful CDEV which displays system information), or use the mini-
-debugger: press the rear (interrupt) programmer's switch, enter DM 400000,
and look at the first four bytes of memory displayed; if they are
4D 1E EE E1 -- then you have the oldest ROM vsn;
4D 1E EA E1 -- you are in the middle (it may be easier to find a fix than
in the first case)
4D 1F 81 72 -- you're OK, and ROM is not the problem; disregard this letter.
There was an article on all this in Sept. 88 Computer Shopper - I noted
down a few details, but threw away the paper volume (awfully big), so I
can't say more. I have vsn. 2, and had no problems booting from an old
Apple 20 HD (Seagate, I believe...) nor from a newer Quantum Pro40s.
Another point: I seem to remember a mention of Apple's policy to provide
newer ROM revisions for us unlucky types free of charge; but when I asked
about it at my friendly Apple dealer, they "couldn't find anything on that",
and I didn't pursue it - wasn't worth my while. You may want to try.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
You probably need to disable pin 4 of the drive cable. The early mac+ had
a problem with the scsi reset, I don't remember all the details, but the
symptoms you descibe were the result.
Just PULL OUT pin four from the db25 connector that plugs into your mac on the
drive cable. Really. It works.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Did you make sure to use the Installer on your System Tools disk to install
a system folder on the HD? With newer systems, just copying over a System
Folder won't cut it--the boot block code won't be updated.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Certain SCSI hard disks cannot be booted from a Mac Plus, although
they can be accessed after the boot, and can be booted fine from Mac SE
and Mac II machines.
There are at least two causes:
1) Some drives go into "unit attention" status after being reset or turned
on. The Mac Plus boot-code doesn't know how to clear the unit-attention
status on the drive, and skips over it. Once the Plus has been booted
from a floppy or another hard disk, the SCSI Manager in the ROM is
patched... and the patched version is capable of resetting the Unit
Attention status and reading in the device driver.
2) Some drives require a couple of seconds to go through a self-test
operation after power-on or bus-reset. The Mac Plus may miss such
devices when it polls the SCSI bus... and if it doesn't see a device
on the bus, it resets the bus and scans again. As a result, the
drive never has a chance to become "ready" and respond to the Mac's
inquiry... it keeps being reset part-way through its self-test
sequence.
You _might_ be able to work around the second problem by making sure that
the drive has had time to spin up before you turn on the Mac Plus. I've
heard that some vendors avoid the problem by clipping the "reset" wire
in the SCSI cable inside the cabinet, so that the drive doesn't get
kicked in the head every second or so.
Drives which insist on going into unit-attention status upon reset cannot,
I believe, be booted from the Plus. Some drives can be configured to
avoid this behavior (setting some flags in a mode-page on the controller
board); this is usually a task for the installer program.
The "Startup Device" CDEV does not work on the classic Mac Plus, although
it may work on some more recent Plus machines. That's almost certainly
not your problem.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
It sounds like you have a boot blocks problem. Don't worry about the set
startup CDEV not appearing. I don't think it works on a Plus because it
depends on some PRAM locations that are unknown to the MacPlus's ROM.
It works on an SE or higher because they have different ROMs. This has
nothing to do with what version of the system software you have. I run
System 6.0.3 on my Mac Plus with no problems, by the way.
You said you used your SE to set startup to the hard drive. But did you,
in fact, turn off your SE and reboot from the hard drive? If you didn't
or aren't able to, then your hard drive probably doesn't have boot blocks
and won't work on either machine until you install boot blocks on it. But
if you did boot your SE from the drive, something weirder is happening.
The Plus will automatically boot from a hard drive if one is present, it
has boot blocks, it has a system file, and no floppy is present. It sounds
like these are all true for you except maybe for the presence of boot
blocks. The drive is probably initialized correctly and has its proper
drivers installed, otherwise you wouldn't see its icon appear on the
desktop after you booted from a floppy.
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 08:38 PST
From: netcom!ric@apple.com (Richard Bretscheider)
Subject: casio to mac interface
In comp.sys.mac.digest you write:
>Indeed, the protocol is not straightforward.
>first of all, the rs232 interface is inverted on the casio, you would need
>an inverter on the input and the output.
>Fortunately on the mac you have a inverted in and out at the ports.Usually
>when
>you connect something to the mac you use rx- and tx-, these are the normal
>rs232
>signals. with the casio you will be using the rx+ and Tx+ connections.
>When you print from the casio, you can receive the information with any com-
>unication program, perhaps you have to strip out those lf's if you will dump
>it on a text processing program.
>I conected a 1kOhm resistor between signals.
>To receive info from mac to the casio, it's a bit more complicated. It
>receives
>in Hex you have to calculate the checksum on each field.
>There is a special comunication protocol, to diferenciate between memo, tel,
>bussinescard and shedule formats and wheter the record is marked or unmarked.
>I made an application based on hypercard. To receive and send cards of
>inmformation. There is a special button that transaltes from excell sheets to
>bussiness card or tel format. It is fully functional,though I hjave to work
>on documentation.
>A friend of mine made another application for mac to casio comunication, it's
>conception is a bit different, you can write him directly to JAIME@UDLAPVMS
>his name is Jaime Iturbe.
>I will prepare you my stack and send it to you this week, also the diagramm of
>the interface.
As an interested party, the originator of the "wierdness" quote, and a
generally
currious party, I'd be interested in your stack as well.
>I was thinking offering my program as shareware, I spend quite a long time and
>work descifring the protocols, and constructing the stack with no help at all.
By all means...tell me what you think it is worth.
I'm a Project Manager for the Macintosh Division of Ashton-Tate. Quite a
few of us have SF7500s, a couple of guys in Product Test. If you'd like
to have some professional testers pound out your bugs, send me a copy.
Thanks
Ric
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 16:15:27 -0500 (EST)
From: "H. Matthews" <hm0i+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Flight Simulator Status
I have been wondering for quite awhile why Microsoft has yet to
release an update to its ANCIENT yet still very popular Flight
Simulator... (usually on MAcUSer or MacWeek top ten sales lists)
I think they are still selling the MACPlus "version", meaning it
won't work on anything above a 68000. I know it doesn't work on IIs
and accelerated SEs.
Has anybody out there heard any news or rumors?
Just curious,
H. Scott Matthews
Carnegie Mellon
ECE
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 09:00 CST
From: Alexander Rubli <RUBLI%UDLAPVMS.BITNET@ricevm1.rice.edu>
Subject: Help interfacing mac to NTSC
I am very desesperate and desilusionated :-( inrefasing mac to NTSC.
We bought a NU Vista card and TV producer card.
everything look OK on the mac but on the NTSC monitor the color look
blurred with a slight different pallete and the definition is very bad :-S
Am I doing something wrong? or is it true that NTSC stands for
"Never Twice the Same Color"?
Is there anybody who has experience in this matter ?
PS. Couls someeone tell me if Truevision or Compuetr Friends got an E-Mail box?
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 5 Feb 90 21:31:09 PST
From: Mark B. Johnson <mjohnson@apple.com>
Subject: Human Interface Notes
The first six Human Interface Notes (updates to the book) are now
available for FTP from Apple.com. They are StuffIt format MacWrite
files available in the ~ftp/pub/dts/human.interface directory and
they are applicable to both Apple II and Macintosh developers.
Apple II sites should expect the January release of Technical Notes
within a few days, and Macintosh sites should expect the February
release of Technical Notes within two weeks.
We also recently got clearance to put some System Software and other
development tools up for FTP, but we have to work out the logistics
of doing it...but its just a matter of time now. Same goes for
SpInside Macintosh. Should be able to put it up in a few weeks if
the decision we are expecting is made. Thanks for the patience.
Mark
-r 2511 Jan 29 14:16 ./press/pr0129-spindler-promoted-loren-resigns.txt
-r 3187 Jan 26 19:01 ./mac/docs/creator-file-type-form.txt
-r 72803 Jan 26 18:54 ./mac/tools/virusrx-16.hqx
-r 5322 Jan 26 18:45 ./press/pr0126-teacher-nominations2.txt
-r 3968 Jan 26 18:44 ./press/pr0123-wright-exhibit-sponsor.txt
-r 4442 Jan 26 18:44 ./press/pr0123-teacher-nominations.txt
-r 118185 Jan 26 10:16 ./mac/tools/cdrom-301.hqx
-r 3803 Jan 26 10:06 ./mac/tools/cdrom-301.txt
-r 57779 Jan 26 09:52 ./mac/sc/sc-011-getzonelist.hqx
-r 229951 Jan 26 09:39 ./mac/sc/sc-009-fracapp300.hqx
-- 0 Feb 5 21:20 ./help/dir-files-recent
-r 3015 Feb 5 21:19 ./README
-r 83586 Feb 5 21:12 ./human.interface/hin.latest.release/hin-90-01.hqx
-r 18015 Feb 5 21:07 ./human.interface/hin-006.hqx
-r 16983 Feb 5 21:07 ./human.interface/hin-005.hqx
-r 10204 Feb 5 21:06 ./human.interface/hin-004.hqx
-r 5701 Feb 5 21:06 ./human.interface/hin-003.hqx
-r 12904 Feb 5 21:05 ./human.interface/hin-002.hqx
-r 15880 Feb 5 21:04 ./human.interface/hin-001.hqx
-r 4931 Feb 5 21:04 ./human.interface/hin-000.hqx
-r 3682 Feb 1 18:04 ./press/pr0129-business-education-forum.txt
-r 1389 Feb 1 18:03 ./press/pr0201-qtr-divid.txt
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 12:12 EST
From: JBRIONE@clemson.clemson.edu
Subject: Info-Mac Digest V8 #26
I believe I have seen this in info-mac before, but
I lost the file. Anyway, here it goes again, is there
any way to communicate or send messages between Applelink
and bitnet/internet?
Jose Briones. JBRIONE@CLEMSON
Clemson, SC.
[Moderator's Note:
There are two ways:
Technique 1:
>From Bitnet to Applelink:
To: XB.DAS@STANFORD.BITNET
Subject: USER@APPLELINK!Optional Actual Subject
>From Applelink to Bitnet:
To: DASNET
Subject: USER.ADDRESS@STANFORD.BITNET!Optional Actual Subject
Technique 2:
user@applelink.apple.com
Warning: There are no guarantees in the internet -- Jon]
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 17:50:07 EST
From: joseph@elbereth.rutgers.edu (Seymour Joseph)
Subject: Info-Mac Digest V8 #26
Nathan,
Bravo for making good use of your antiquated Macs. I think you are
confused about AppleShare though. The Ehman drive probably came with
a newer version of the operating system, which has included the USER
(CLIENT) part of AppleShare for several revisions. The Server part
of the software comes on several disks with a big manual telling you
how to set it up. I don't know any vendors that ship the AppleShare
file SERVER with their drives. You will need the server software to
make use of the client software.
Seymour
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 14:59:22 GMT
From: jmh@ns.network.com (Joel Halpern)
Subject: Initial Color Palette
I was writing a program to manipulate the current palette of colors on
my MAC II when I ran into a simple problem. I am using the Palette Manager,
and need to create/get the initial (current) palette. The only way I could
find to do this was to get 'clut' 8, and turn it into a palette. This is
obviously not the only way, since some other programs find the current palette,
as distinct from the initial palette.
Can anyone tell me how to find the current palette?
Thanks,
Joel M. Halpern jmh@nsco.network.com
Network Systems Corporation
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 11:07 EST
From: "PAUL R. POTTS" <PPOTTS%WATSON.BITNET@forsythe.stanford.edu>
Subject: Jasmine experiences solicited
Hello all,
I am soliciting the experiences that purchasers, resellers, and
users have had with Jasmine Inc., and its hard disk drives. I am
interested in statistics about failure rates, time required for turnaround
of drives sent in for repair, problems users have had trying to get
information from the company by phone, and any other experiences that
might be relevant. I would also be happy to hear positive experiences
that users have had with Jasmine. Please send mail to me directly
(PPOTTS@WOOSTER) and I will summarize the statistics for Info-Mac. I
will be happy to put any (short) statements directly into my report if
asked and if the person making the statement gives his or her name.
Thanks in advance...
Paul R. Potts
Intern for Documentation
Academic Computing Services
The College of Wooster
Bitnet: PPOTTS@WOOSTER
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 10:42 EST
From: <FILLMORE%EMRCAN.BITNET@forsythe.stanford.edu>
Subject: Mac+ speeds (vs. A-Max)
Pottie Karl was wondering why A-Max is so much faster than a Mac Plus
and the Atari ST when running Mac emulation. The answer is that the Amiga
has hardware graphics assist - bitmaps are moved and lines drawn using the
hardware blitter chip. This does not require any CPU time because the blitter
and other custom Amiga chips run concurrently with the CPU. On the Mac
and Atari all of this bit pushing must be done in the CPU. It's a tribute
to the designers of the Mac ROM code that the speed difference isn't greater
than it is.
________________________
Bob Fillmore, Systems Software & Communications BITNET: FILLMORE@EMRCAN
Computer Services Centre, BIX: bfillmore
Energy, Mines, & Resources Canada Voice: (613) 992-2832
588 Booth St., Ottawa, Ontario, Canada K1A 0E4 FAX: (613) 996-2953
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 19:41:23 MEZ
From: M. Cohen PI
Subject: Mac Japanese Kanji
I am currently studying Japanese .I am therefore looking for a package includin
g all the Japanese Characters (Kanjis,hiraganas and Katakanas ) on the mac.
Does anyone know a good package (incl. fonts) on the market ?
Thank you in advance for your cooperation
Marc Cohen
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 08:55 CST
From: "Jeffrey O. Smith" <B609CSE@utarlg.arl.utexas.edu>
Subject: Mathematica
Does anyone know where an archive of Mathematica packages
or notebooks are? This is an AMAZING application!!
Thanks in advance, I'll post summary if you mail to:
B609CSE@UTARLG
=or=
smith@UTARLG.ARL.UTEXAS.EDU
Jeff
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 09:55:06 CST
From: hallett@pet16.med.ge.com (Jeff Hallett x5163 )
Subject: Mouse action and Timers in Supercard
Hi folks -
I am quite new to Supercard and might have missed these two answers in
the manual, but I really need some quick help:
1. I need to be able to read the mouse cursor position. Can I do
this QUICKLY? Further, I know this is frowned upon, but in this case
necessary - is there a way to alter the cursor motion (e.g. constrain
the mouse motion to a vertical line only [ie throw out delta-x])?
2. I would like to be able to set a timer that sends a message when
it goes off to a specific object. Is there a way to do this? If
someone has X* code that I can use, great, but I'm not a sophisticated
enough Mac programmer to develop it myself in the time I have.
Thanks in advance for help - if you email me answers, I'll summarize.
Jeffrey A. Hallett, PET Software Engineering
GE Medical Systems, W641, PO Box 414, Milwaukee, WI 53201
(414) 548-5163 : EMAIL - hallettJ@gemed.ge.com
"Comments, Spock?", "Very bad poetry Captain."
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 14:52:08 EDT
From: Denis Beauchemin <IN10%UDESVM.BITNET@forsythe.stanford.edu>
Subject: White Knight/Red Ryder
Hi all,
I agree with Jurgen Botz about White Knight (and RR): it stinks. I've used
the product for many years and I never could remember where to go to change
one setup option. I used it because I couldn't afford MicroPhone. I now
use ZTerm and like it a lot (so I paid for it). About WK/RR:
There has never been any organization in the different menus and it's now
even worse with White Knight 11: you can't find a menu choice easily
because it still isn't organized and now you have to skip over his double
command codes (for example, to achieve one action you have to press
command-s followed by command-b).
Since the Mac doesn't support such stupid things (but MS-DOS machines do),
Scott Watson had to insert them before the menu text to be able to show
them in the menus. You then have menus that look like this:
Local > Status Bar > %SG: General
%SB: Buffered Keyboard
%SM: Macro Keys
%SV: VT100 Keys
%SH: Hide Status Bar (replace the % sign with a
command sign) Don't forget that menus are displayed using the Chicago font
and thus all characters are not equal width. That makes menu reading a
royal pain!
One other thing I don't like about the program: it can't start a ZModem
receive (download) automatically! You have to start it manually. It's the
only program I know of (on micros) that can't start a ZModem download by
itself!
--> Denis Beauchemin, Analyste --> IN10@UDESVM.BITNET
Departement de mathematiques (819) 821-7022
et d'informatique
Universite de Sherbrooke
------------------------------
End of Info-Mac Digest
******************************