[Coco] NitrOS-9 nightly builds, DriveWire4 beta 1.5

[Bob Devries]

Excellent work.

I'm looking forward to being re-united with my coco and desktop computers in 
a month or so, so I can try this all out. Three weeks to go until I go back 
to Australia.

Regards, Bob Devries

--
Besides a mathematical inclination, an exceptionally good mastery of one's 
native tongue is the most vital asset of a competent programmer.

Edsger W.Dijkstra, 18 June 1975

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Aaron Wolfe" <aawolfe at gmail.com>
To: "CoCoList for Color Computer Enthusiasts" <coco at maltedmedia.com>
Sent: Tuesday, April 06, 2010 6:17 PM
Subject: [Coco] NitrOS-9 nightly builds, DriveWire4 beta 1.5


> It has been an eventful couple of days!  As I mentioned recently, Robert
> Gault finished making all the games in the NitrOS-9 CVS build correctly 
> for
> DriveWire use.  Today Boisy resurrected the NitrOS-9 nightly build 
> process.
> We added a step that writes all the disk images to the SF web server each
> night.
>
> You can get the very latest disk images for NitrOS-9 (and lots of games 
> and
> other things) here:  http://www.nitros9.org/latest/
>
> This includes disks for use with all NitrOS-9 supported platforms and in 
> all
> supported disk formats.  Every morning at about 3:15AM EST these images 
> are
> rebuilt from the current source.
>
> I've also put a new DW4 beta version up at:
> http://sites.google.com/site/drivewire4/beta
>
> This new version includes many new features:
>
> * Support for multiple CoCos (as many as you have serial ports).  Each can
> be bound to it's own network interface if desired.
> * All configuration is now merged into a single XML file
> * Preliminary support for external user interfaces.  For now you can 
> telnet
> to the UI port (default 6800) and issue 'dw' commands, etc.  Soon a
> graphical UI will do this for you :)
> * 'sendmail' command for sending emails from the CoCo is included
> * and.. most interesting to me..  I've preloaded the config with disk sets
> for all of the images now found on the NitrOS9 nightly disk web site.
>
> This is the beginning of the online disk directory I've been wanting to 
> put
> together for quite some time.  Using the dw command in OS-9 (or via the UI
> port) you can list the available disk sets and load the latest build
> directly from the web.  You could even set your system to boot off the
> nightly NitrOS-9 disk image.
>
> For example, when you type "dw disk set show", you get a list of all the
> games and bootable disks available:
>
> {N2|03}/DD:dw disk set show
>
> Available disk sets:
>
> dw4boot-6309          dw4boot-6809          nos9-6309l2
> nos9-6309l2-headless  nos9-6809l2           nos9-6809l2-headless
> nos9-6809l1-coco1     nos9-6809l1-coco2     mv-6309
> mv-6809               blackcauldron         xmas86
> flightsim2            goldrush              kingq1
> kingq2                kingq3                kingq4
> koronis               kyumgai               lslarry
> manhunt1              manhunt2              microm
> policeq               rof                   spaceq0
> spaceq1               spaceq2               aaw-dev
>
>
> {N2|03}/DD:
>
>
> Now I can look at the details for a particular set if I'd like:
>
> {N2|03}/DD:dw disk set show lslarry
>
> Details for disk set 'lslarry':
>
> Description: Leisure Suit Larry
>
> X0: http://www.nitros9.org/latest/leisuresuitlarry_dw3.dsk (boot)
>
> {N2|03}/DD:
>
>
> You can see that this disk set simply uses a URL that points to the latest
> disk image.  (A disk set can contain several disks, but this set only 
> needs
> one).  I can type "dw disk set load lslarry", press reset, and I'm playing
> the game.
>
> I think this is a great way to make CoCo software available.  The 
> maintainer
> can put a single disk image on the web or an FTP site, or even a .zip with
> several disks in it (DW4 can load disk images directly from inside zip 
> files
> on remote servers).  Only one copy to update, etc, and any user can load 
> the
> program/boot right from that copy.
> With DW, you can save a disk image to a different path than it was loaded
> from, so if a user wants their own copy it's as easy as clicking Save As..
> (or it will be, at least :)
>
> In the future, these disk sets will be selectable using a pretty GUI that
> types all the commands and even takes care of resetting the CoCo for you.
> Select a game, press go, and the CoCo starts playing it.
>
> -Aaron
>
> --
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