[Coco] Making OS-9/NitrOS9 more user friendly Facebook group discussion

[Bill Pierce]

Christopher, you are correct in both respects, in that I do have a project and it IS a large task.

I have a program under development ("BootMajik") that will make "boot making" a breeze. I ran into a couple of snags with the database format recently, and also found that I have a bug somewhere causing my in-memory database to get wiped out at some point. I was working on fixing this when I started getting calls to do recording, which hasn't seemed stopped. I had to tear down all my Coco gear and pack it in a corner to make room in my small studio for a full rock band. I hope to get back on it soon.

Anyone familiar with my MShell project will know the GUI used for BootMajik as it runs as a module under MShell. Anyone using NitrOS9 who has not tried MShell has not seen what "Ease Of Use" really means.

BootMajik will consist of a 4 column screen. The first column displays the "root" module types... (RBF, SCF, System, etc). When you click or select with keyboard) on an item, the next column shows all managers or drivers for that type. Clicking on one of these modules displays all modules of the next level in the next column and same for the 4th column. When a module is "selected", a short, 2 line description of the module appears in the status bar at the bottom of the screen.

There is already a menu system in place in which you start new boots which allows you to select machine (Coco 1, 2, 3, Dragon, Coco3FPGA, etc), CPU (6809 & 6309), and NitrOS9 level (1 & 2), which when system selection is completed, the proper database for that system is loaded automatically. The software only displays modules based on the system you select. Once you've created a bootlist, you can save the list for later use, or create the OS9Boot file (or both, allowing you to create unlimited OS9Boot files for different systems and keep a database of all your boots.

The module databases are based on the current modules available in the repo and I will eventually add an editor to create new databases as well as edit current module databases to add/delete new modules to existing databases.

The program suite will only run on a 512k Coco3 running NitrOS9, but will create boot files for any machine supported by the repo (and a couple that are not, such as emulators). Also, a large capacity storage system will be needed to keep the large databases online, such as a hard drive, VHD for DW4, or LBA mode disk in CocoSDC.

I was hoping to have it ready for release by Christmas, but once again, real life (and rock-n-roll) gets in the way. Maybe by the 2018 Last Annual CocoFest... Someone could show it off for me :-)

Here's the BootMajik blog with a few screenshots.
https://sites.google.com/site/dabarnstudio/bootmajik

 

 

Bill Pierce
"Charlie stole the handle, and the train it won't stop going, no way to slow down!" - Ian Anderson - Jethro Tull

My Music from the Tandy/Radio Shack Color Computer 2 & 3
https://sites.google.com/site/dabarnstudio/
Co-Contributor, Co-Editor for CocoPedia
http://www.cocopedia.com/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

E-Mail: ooogalapasooo at aol.com

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: Christopher R. Hawks <chawks at dls.net>
To: coco <coco at maltedmedia.com>
Sent: Fri, Nov 17, 2017 7:07 am
Subject: Re: [Coco] Making OS-9/NitrOS9 more user friendly Facebook group discussion

I believe Bill P. (?) is working toward that, but, it sounds like ahuge job...Christopher R. HawksHAWKSoft-- Love is the only game that is not called on account of darkness.----------------------------------------       \ ^__^                                 \  (oo)\_______                           (__)\       )\/\                          ||----w |                            ||     ||                -- Coco mailing listCoco at maltedmedia.comhttps://pairlist5.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/coco