[Coco] Problem with dw command

[Gene Heskett]

On Tuesday, February 17, 2015 09:53:44 AM Robert Gault wrote:
> elderpav--- via Coco wrote:
> > Thanks Bill, it worked. It was a little tricky tho trying to shoehorn
> > those extra modules into my OS9Boot file, but I got it done. :-)
> > 
> > Fred Provoncha
> > Stansbury Park, UT
> 
> Actually you can load these modules after booting by including in your
> startup file the name of a merged file containing scdwv+/n+/n1+etc.
> Place the file, say scdwvModules in the CMDS directory with 'attr e
> pe', then the line in startup is: load scdwvModules
> 
> Robert

Does this not waste a page of system ram, a very valuable resource?

Our current method of having just one bootlist is cumbersom and due to the 
compartmenting (a new word?) (seperating drivers from descriptors etc) 
done when that list is generated, sure makes it a chore to get all this 
right.  I have given some thought but no keyboard effort, into being able 
to source a given list of modules from a separate file, in the manner you 
suggested above, so that a bootfile could be equipt with a known good set 
of dependencies, or to strip them out cleanly by skipping that files 
inclusion.

The one thing I haven't checked out yet is our shell's ability to accept a

. ./filename_of_list_of_modules 

syntax.  Reading the source for shell-2.2+ should answer that.  But it 
sure would be nice if a given stanza of the /sys/helpmsg file could mature 
into the equ of a man page.  Each of these helpmsg stanza's should include 
the info of the parent file manager, and a list of this drivers 
descriptors with a half line synopsis of what they do.

Too many times even an old hand like me is working in the dark. 
Particularly when my memory of details 25 years old is fading.  Or was in 
too many cases negated by changes Boisy made in modularizing the code. 
When he broke up co80 for instance, the wp-rs driver was removed and I 
haven't a clue how to actually load it and use it today.  And everytime he 
made 3 modules out of what was one, there are now 2 more sysram gobbling 
entries in the module list.

dmode and xmode can extract the name of the driver a descriptor needs, so 
its possible that a list like that can be manually composed, however, 
because there is not an associated filemanagers name in a .dr file, we are 
deadended in our quest to start with a descriptor and follow it clear back 
to the correct file manager.  Hence comes the idea of having a canned 
script to bring in a complete, working function in a single line of code 
in the bootlist.  If this sourcing could be done in a sourced file, making 
a 2 or 3 layer process, then dw could even have bits and pieces switched 
in and out easily, and error free.  Making the /x descriptors & driver one 
subfile, the /n descriptors & driver another, ditto for the /z's.

This would, I'd think, make life a lot easier for both the oldtimer and 
the new bee.

Comments?

Cheers, Gene Heskett
-- 
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