Hi All,

I'm a first time poster, long time lurker.

I have set up a dos VM on my laptop, I have copied a c:\ off one of our Frame 6 <I> machines and attempted to get it running on my laptop so I can test some changes before actually doing them on the actual <I>.

The problem I'm having is: once the autoexec.bat executes and the menu.exe loads I lose use of the keyboard, which then means I can't exit out to dos or use the rung display etc.

Does anyone know of a way around this? I imagine that I need to comment out a line somewhere so that the VM doesn't try to look for a different keyboard once it kicks off the RUN_IDP

Kind Regards,
Adam

 

Hello

Have you try some different virtual machine manager? I'm interested in that, could you contact me directly?

Gabriele

[email protected]

please remove the word remove in the email address before answer.

 

Adam, a.k.a. BigLidster,

I've never tried to run IDOS on a virtual machine, but I can tell you that there were some versions of BIOS that would not allow IDOS to run, and one of the signature indicators of a BIOS compatibility issue was the keyboard not working. Some IBM laptops used a BIOS that was incompatible, but GE Salem wrote a "patch" executable that could be run to make the keyboard visible to IDOS. (GE used to contract with IBM to supply ThinkPad laptops (notebooks, really) to field engineers, so that's why GE Salem wrote the executable to make the keyboard work with the BIOS used for most ThinkPad laptops.)

I strongly suspect you have run into this issue with the VM software you are using. VMWare makes a free non-commercial VM application that can be downloaded and installed to see if IDOS would run with it (I've never tried running IDOS in a virtual machine environment.)

I do know people who have used DOSBox successfully with some later versions of IDOS; don't know if this is a VM or not, but it might be something worth looking into.

I've personally had difficulty running MS-DOS on some post-Pentium machines, because I think modern OSes have different ways of accessing hard drives and keyboards and interrupts (ports and such) that the modern BIOS and processors need but MS-DOS doesn't have.

If you find a VM that works, or if you find out how to trick the Oracle VM into working, it would be most helpful if you could post how you were able to make it work.

I seem to recall MS-Win95 and, if I recall correctly, MS-WinXP, had "command prompt shell" capabilities that could run IDOS without installing a VM. One created a desktop shortcut icon to this utility (which was part of MS-Win95, and I believe MS-WinXP) and it would run the IDOS AUTOEXEC.BAT and IO.SYS and everything would be just fine (again, presuming the BIOS on the PC was compatible!).

Again, please let us know how you fare in getting this to work.

 

Adam, a.k.a. BigLidster,

Another thing to consider is that IDOS was written for serial mouse and a serial or PS/2 keyboard....

Are you sure your VM is configured properly for "passing" the keyboard and mouse to IDOS? I'm not sure how you would do that, but I'm not aware that IDOS can be made to operate with USB mice and keyboards.

Again, please write back to let us know how you fare with this issue!

 

CSA,

It could well be a BIOS issue, I didn't know about the BIOS compatibility issues

Perhaps naively I thought that by setting up a virtual dos machine, installing dos 6.22 then pkunzipping a full c:\ off an <I> onto the VM it would work.

It was a partial success in that if I interrupt the VM as it loads MS DOS and stop it from running the autoexec.bat I can go to F:\unit1 and run MSE.EXE (after setting up the logical drives as the autoexec would), in this program the keyboard works fine. It also works fine for browsing through directories, editing files etc.

Would the BIOS being incompatible prevent the functions I described above from working?

Regarding the USB/Mouse issue we have a spare <I> station I have been playing with too, a USB keyboard does work with it, sometimes you have to unplug it and plug it back in again when it first boots up but apart from that its ok. I couldn't get the USB mouse to work though.

I'll keep chipping away at this when i'm back at the office. I'm out on another site at the moment. If I have any breakthroughs I'll post them on here.

BigLidster

 

BigLidster,

This is an easy one--now that I understand what it is exactly you're wanting to do.

The only <I> functions you need IDOS for are anything to do with displays that involve putting data values on the screen--the Main Display, any animated display, any User Defined (Demand) Displays--and alarms.

All the other programs like the Master Sequence Editor, the Table Compiler, the Control Sequence Compiler--in short, any of the functions that MK5MAKE.BAT preforms--<b><i>DO NOT REQUIRE</b></i> IDOS to be running. They run under just about any command prompt under MS-Windows.

The caveat here (and there's always a caveat, isn't there?!?!) is that you must have the proper directory structure, and by that I mean you need to have the files from F:\UNITn in one directory, and then you need to have all the files from F:\UNITn\PROM in a PROM subdirectory to that directory. You may need to have a read of the MK5MAKE.BAT file, but I don't think it cares what directory or drive it runs in--the programs it runs must be in the proper "structure." This includes MSE.EXE, which as you've already discovered, doesn't need IDOS to be running.

If you're making changes to Control Sequence Program segment files or .ASG files or any Table Files (Control Constants, etc.), you just need to put the necessary files in a directory (from F:\UNITn) and the files from it's PROM subdirectory (F:\UNITn\PROM) in a PROM subdirectory to the "main" directory. Then just copy the files you need from G:\EXEC (MSE.EXE; the programs which MK5MAKE.BAT needs), and then do your thing!

You can even copy the modified files (the CSP Segment Source files, any ASCII text Table files, as well as the compiled files--including UNITDATA.DAT) back to the <I> to the proper directory(s), and re-start the <I>, and download the compiled files to the Mark V, re-boot the Mark V processors one at a time, and you should be a Happy Camper!

If I recall correctly, even the I/O Configurator can be run outside of IDOS. Again, the only thing you need IDOS for is displays and alarms. All other changes and modifications can be done on any PC which runs MS-Windows. You don't even need to load MS-DOS 6.22 into a VM. Most versions of MS-Windows up to and including MS-WinXP were really command-line OSs, with a GUI (Graphical User Interface) running on top of them. So, when you clicked on something what was basically happening is that command-line executables were working in the background. When you open up a command line session (DOS prompt session), you can do COPY and DELETE and MOVE and all of the things MS-DOS did from the DOS prompt.

Hope this helps!