[Coco] using /ddr0 as default (not boot) drive

Robert Gault robert.gault at att.net
Fri Jun 24 08:53:22 EDT 2011


Boisy G. Pitre wrote:
> Ed,
>
> I am going through the steps in my mind on how to try this here on my 512K CoCo 3.  Here are the steps:
>
> 1. Create a bootable disk with r0 and rammer in the bootfile
> 2. Boot into that disk, then type the following commands:
> 	- iniz /r0
> 	- format /r0
> 	- makdir /r0/CMDS
>          - copy sysgo -w=/r0
>          - copy CMDS/shell -w=/r0/CMDS
>          - copy CMDS/grftdrv -w=/r0/CMDS
>
> 3. Use DED and modify the bootfile on the floppy disk to rename the existing DD descriptor to DX, and rename R0 to be DD
> 4. Hit the reset button.
>
> Are your steps similar?
> --
> Boisy G. Pitre
> http://www.tee-boy.com/

Boisy,

That would work the first time and as long as the power was not turned off. Then 
the floppy would be unusable for booting as /dd would be /r0 which had not yet 
been stocked.

Ed's main question is why the Help and Error functions don't work from the RAM disk.
The source code for Help has
helpfile fcc    "/DD/SYS/helpmsg"
That means each time the reset button is pushed, Error and Help get redirected 
to /d0.

Ed should create a new Help file by using dEd to change the program to
/R0/SYS/helpmsg . Then a Reset and a chd /r0; chx /r0/cmds would keep Help 
working from the RAM disk as long as the stock Help was not loaded into memory 
by the re-Boot process. Error could be treated in the same fashion.

So when stocking /R0, the new Error and Help commands pointing to /R0 should be 
placed in /R0/CMDS and the stock commands left in /D0/CMDS.



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