merce@iguana.uucp (Jim Mercer) (01/25/91)
[ forgive me if this concept has be shot to hell already ] there exist on the market a number of "thingy"'s that attach to the parallel port. most of them are called printers. 8^) but there are newer gizmos which can, with drivers under MS-DOS, adapt the port into a SCSI controller or an ethernet NIC. on the unix-pc/CT miniframe, you can write loadable device drivers. could a driver be implemented to use one of these devices? on another note. could a device driver be written to do SLIP on the serial port(s) and interface with the pty's? just wondering. -- [ Jim Mercer work: jim@lsuc.on.ca home: merce@iguana.uucp +1 519 570-3467 ] [ "Clickity-Click, Barba-Trick" - The Barbapapas ]
thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan) (01/25/91)
merce@iguana.uucp (Jim Mercer) in <1991Jan25.035120.11117@iguana.uucp> writes:
there exist on the market a number of "thingy"'s that attach to the
parallel port.
[...]
but there are newer gizmos which can, with drivers under MS-DOS, adapt
the port into a SCSI controller or an ethernet NIC.
[...]
on the unix-pc/CT miniframe, you can write loadable device drivers.
could a driver be implemented to use one of these devices?
Nope. The 3B1/UNIXPC's parallel port is NOT a programmable I/O device with
data-direction registers; it is a printer port, period.
Thad Floryan [ thad@cup.portal.com ]jbm@uncle.uucp (John B. Milton) (01/29/91)
In article <1991Jan25.035120.11117@iguana.uucp> merce@iguana.uucp (Jim Mercer) writes: >[ forgive me if this concept has be shot to hell already ] > >there exist on the market a number of "thingy"'s that attach to the parallel >port. >most of them are called printers. 8^) >but there are newer gizmos which can, with drivers under MS-DOS, adapt the >port into a SCSI controller or an ethernet NIC. >on the unix-pc/CT miniframe, you can write loadable device drivers. >could a driver be implemented to use one of these devices? >on another note. could a device driver be written to do SLIP on the serial >port(s) and interface with the pty's? I talked with a company that has a parallel port Ethernet thingy, and said I would love to make it work for my computer. They said there was NO WAY they could release hardware specs or source. As far as the software, the low level stuff to get through the port would be fairly straight forward. The really difficult stuff is the higher level software. John -- John Bly Milton IV, jbm@uncle.UUCP, n8emr!uncle!jbm@osu-cis.cis.ohio-state.edu (614) h:252-8544, w:252-1952; N8KSN, AMPR: 44.70.0.52; Don't FLAME, inform!
rlw@ttardis.UUCP (Ron Wilson) (02/02/91)
In article <38458@cup.portal.com>, thad@cup.portal.com (Thad P Floryan) writes: >merce@iguana.uucp (Jim Mercer) in <1991Jan25.035120.11117@iguana.uucp> writes: > > there exist on the market a number of "thingy"'s that attach to the > parallel port. > [...] > but there are newer gizmos which can, with drivers under MS-DOS, adapt > the port into a SCSI controller or an ethernet NIC. > [...] > on the unix-pc/CT miniframe, you can write loadable device drivers. > could a driver be implemented to use one of these devices? > >Nope. The 3B1/UNIXPC's parallel port is NOT a programmable I/O device with >data-direction registers; it is a printer port, period. While I can't speak for these parallel port SCSI and ethernet adaptors, I do know that PC products like Fast-Lynx (aka Fast-Wire), Brooklin Bridge, Lap Link and others use the port data pins ONLY as outputs and use the control signal inputs for data input - thus only transfering 4 data bits at a time with OUT reconfiguring the parallel port. In theory, the same trick could be used with the Unix-PC parallel port. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- About MS-DOS: "... an OS originally designed for a microprocessor that modern kitchen appliances would sneer at...." - Dave Trowbridge, _Computer Technology Review_, Aug 90 iwblsys\ rlw@ttardis uunet!rel.mi.org!cfctech!ttardis!rlw sharkey.cc.umich.edu/