[Coco] early OS-9 ads/articles compilation

[Joel Ewy]

Frank Swygert wrote:
> TAPE BASED OS-9?? Come on now! Tape was barely usable with ECB. 

Now, I never suggested running a non-disk OS-9 system in 1980-81 would 
be comfortable.  But I was speculating about why the people who brought 
us ROM-based EDTASM didn't adapt an existing concept:  running OS-9 from 
ROM, using the cassette for mass-storage.  This was actually done on 
other systems, it isn't hypothetical.

I'm not talking about booting OS-9 from tape, but booting from a ROM 
PAK.  The limiting factor there may have been the size of affordable ROM 
chips at the time.  But in a non-disk system you wouldn't need RBF, the 
floppy driver, or any floppy descriptors.  You wouldn't need the pipe 
file manager and its accompanying modules.  You would need an SCF 
manager, a tape driver, and a /c cassette device descriptor, as well as 
the VDG driver and term.  You would need a shell, load, save, and maybe 
mdir.  I'm not sure if all that would fit in an 8K ROM or not.  Maybe 
it's an occasion to boot Level 1 and add up the module sizes.

What about 2 8K ROMs in the PAK and a bit of TTL to switch them?  The 
first ROM autostarts a boot module that puts the CoCo into all-RAM mode 
and loads the ROMed bootfile.  It then switches to the other ROM and 
loads the shell and a few utilities from it.  You'd be in a shell nearly 
instantly.  (These days of course I've got piles of 64K EPROMs and even 
bigger flash ROMs salvaged out of old PC motherboards, but we're talking 
about '80-81...)

Now you can load other utilities from cassette and save your data files 
on tape.  Slow, yes.  And sequential access is a pain.  But I don't see 
why it would have been any worse than ECB. 

I think that mainly OS-9 on the CoCo 1/2 was an afterthought for Tandy, 
and they just didn't move on OS-9 until farther into the floppy disk 
era.  And it was aimed at (what they perceived to be) a different 
audience than the Quasar Commander crowd, though I've certainly enjoyed 
both.

JCE
> Anyone doing much serious with the CoCo definitely got disk as soon as 
> they could. I did some word processing working with tape for a bit 
> over a year before I could afford to build a budget disk system (new 
> third party disk controller, 360K drives that were pulls, built a case 
> and bought a surplus power supply). I was an E-4 in the USAF in 1987 
> when I did that, with a wife and kid.
> OS-9 in a disk controller ROM makes a lot more sense. The only problem 
> I see if that configurations varied. It would still have been a viable 
> option. Have the ROM version boot then look for a configuration 
> file/script that would load any additional drivers/modules needed. 
> You'd just need some kind of configuration program to create the 
> config file. Well, it wouldn't really be NEEDED, but that would be the 
> way to go for a system for the masses.
> So why hasn't someone done something like this with NitrOS-9 now? It 
> would work well with one of Roger's wireless paks or with Drivewire 
> through a bit-banger.
> Speaking of Drivewire and Roger's CoCoNet... Many have a complete 
> Intel/AMC PC available to use as a server that they also use for other 
> things. But what about those who don't want a hulking case on their 
> desk just for drives? Would it be possible to program a PIC or some 
> other minimal board to work with one of those? I'm thinking the system 
> could be as little as a single half-height hard drive in a full height 
> case. There are some small 386 boards that could be used with USB 
> ports that could load software and provide for further expansion. All 
> that's needed is a minimal Linux or maybe even DOS system to boot and 
> run on it, boot from a USB drive and be able to install itself to the 
> hard drive.
>
> ---------------------
> Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:10:21 -0600
> From: Joel Ewy <jcewy at swbell.net>
>
> 3.  I always knew that OS-9 was designed to be "ROMable" but the the 
> earliest OS-9 ads, describing a ROM-based system that even supported 
> KC tape systems makes me wonder anew why OS-9 on the CoCo wasn't 
> available as a ROM PAK with cassette support, at least as one optional 
> configuration.  This was Motorola's big idea, and Tandy certainly took 
> to it for games, and even applications.  It was certainly technically 
> feasible.  Think how many more CoCo users might have gotten into OS-9 
> if it was available on e.g. a $79.99 cartridge that could save 
> programs and files on cassette.
>