[Coco] cobbler'd disks

mike delyea mdelyea at gmail.com
Tue May 15 20:57:15 EDT 2007


Here's whats on the screen

KRel Boot Krn tb0..........................etc...............bKrnP2 IOMan
Init RBF rb1773 DD D0 D1 D2
Rammer i2xot*j

Then "FAILED" comes up under NITROS9 BOOT.  Please note that I have tried it
without the ram disk also and it stops about the same place.  At this point,
I can't even make a boot disk using mb and standard.bl.  The only way I can
make another boot disk in NitrOS-9 is to format a disk and do a backup (this
is a DS 40 disk), not very customized eh.  In OS-9 I can only make 35 or 40
track SINGLE sided boot disks.

On 5/15/07, Christopher Hawks <chawks at dls.net> wrote:
>
> mike delyea wrote:
> > dmode /dd shows
> > nam=DD mgr=RBF ddr=rb1773 hpn=07 hpa=FF40 drv=00 stp=03 typ=20 dns=01
> > cyl=0028
> > sid=02 vfy=01 sct=0012 t0s=0012 ilv=03 sas=08 wpc= ofs= rwc=
> >
> > dmode /d0 shows the same except for the nam part (which is D0 instead of
> > DD).  dmode /d1 is also the same.  I am only using 360k 5.25 floppy
> drives.
>
> Mike:
>
>         When you boot the NitrOS-9 disk, what appears on the screen?? You
> should see
> the "NitrOS-9 Boot" in the center of the screen and if you are using a 40
> or 80
> column /term, a bunch of debug data.
>
>         Attached you'll find a copy of my article from the Coco123
> (Glenside
> Newsletter) describing that the boot process is doing as each part of the
> debug
> data appears. It has always (for me) shown what part of the process is
> going
> into the weeds.
>
>
> --
> Christopher R. Hawks
> HAWKSoft
> ---------------------------------------------------------
> When you say 'I wrote a program that crashed Windows', people just stare
> at you blankly and say 'Hey, I got those with the system, for free'
>         -- Linus Torvalds
>
>
> NitrOS-9 Level 2 Booting and (trouble)Shooting.
>
> by Chris Hawks.  12 May 2006
>
>         One of our local Coco-nuts was having a problem with NitrOS-9 on
> his Coco3. It had recently stopped booting NitrOS-9 from HDB-DOS in
> his SuperIDE. We got together at the monthly Glenside Color Computer Club
> meeting to see if we could resolve the problem. He brought his system
> and I brought a sub-set of my system to the meeting. We were the
> 'presentation' for that meeting. I booted my system from HDB-DOS and
> my SuperIDE adapter with his compactflash card in a compactflash to
> IDE adapter as the slave drive. After my systems booted, I looked at
> the root directory of his compactflash card. It looked OK to me, but,
> he did have some odd files there. I shut down my system and swapped the
> compactflash cards.  (His as mastr and mine as slave. The boot process
> started and loaded track 34 and the OS9boot and then just stopped. From
> the debugging clues posted to the screen during the boot process, I was
> able to determine the the boot process was unable to find the 'sysgo'
> module. I re-booted with my compactflash as master and his as slave,
> and copied 'sysgo' from my root directory to his. We swapped the
> compactflash cards once again and his compact flash was able to boot!
>
>         I was asked to write-up our adventure as a article for the GCCC
> newsletter (Coco 1 2 3). I had not been able to find and information on
> debugging the boot process in NitrOS-9 (except from the source code) so
> here it is.
>
> STEP 1
>         The modules 'rel', 'boot', and 'krn' are loaded into memory from
> track 34 by the 'dos' command. 'Rel' ensures that it is located in the
> correct part of memory, sets up some of the hardware, clears the screen,
> and installs the debugging 'print' routine. It prints 'NITROS9 BOOT' in
> the center of the screen and jumps to the execution address of the
> module 'krn'.
>
> STEP 2
>         The module 'krn' uses the debug 'print' routine to put a 'K' on
> the
> startup screen. It validates the modules in memory ('rel', boot, and
> 'krn') which prints their names on the startup screen and makes a system
> call (F$Boot) which puts a 't' on the startup screen and links the module
> 'boot'. It puts a 'b' on the startup screen and calls 'boot'. 'Boot' reads
> LSN0 to find OS9boot and puts a '0' on the startup screen. 'Boot' then
> loads OS9boot and puts a '.' on the startup screen for each sector read.
> '$F$Boot' validates all modules in OS9boot which prints their names to the
> screen, and puts a second 'b' on the startup screen. Next 'krn' links to
> the 'init' module and puts 'i' on the startup screen. Following this it
> links to and executes 'krnp2' the second part of the kernel.
>
> STEP 3
>         'Krnp2' puts a '2' on the startup screen, and puts an 'x' on the
> startup screen. Then 'krnp2' tries to 'chd' to the system device named in
> 'init' (usually '/dd'). Next 'krnp2' puts a 'o' on the startup screen and
> tries to open the output console named in 'init' (usually '/term').
> 'Krnp2'
> checks for 'krnp3' and runs it if available. Then 'krnp2' puts a 'C' on
> the startup screen and tries to run the startup module named in init
> usually 'sysgo'.
>
> STEP 4
>         'Sysgo' opens the output console, prints the NitrOS-9 startup
> banner
> and sets the data and exec directories. 'Sysgo' will execute 'startup' and
> 'autoexec' if available (unless you hold the 'shift' key) and finally
> starts a 'shell' on the console.
>
>         If something goes wrong during the boot, the module will call the
> 'crash' routine which will put a '*' and single character on the startup
> screen.  The '*' indicates that an error occured and the character's ascii
> value plus 128 is the error number. For instance '*X' would indicate a
> 'Path Name Not Found' error. 'X' is ascii 88, and 88 + 128 = 216, the
> error code for 'Path Name Not Found'. This is the error we saw when sysgo
> was missing from the root directory of the disk.
>
>         So, the start up messages look something like this:
> Krel boot krn tb0...................................................
> ......... bkrnp2 dd d0 rbf rb1773 term w w1 w2 w3 w4 scf cowin clock
> clock2 init i2xoC
>
>         Of course, YMMV (Your Modules May Vary)
>
>         This should give you some insight into what goes on during a
> NitrOS-9
> boot, and berhaps some debugging assistance when something goes wrong.
>
>
>
> --
> Coco mailing list
> Coco at maltedmedia.com
> http://five.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/coco
>
>



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