Subject: MESS mess

From: Owen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2011 20:59:45 -0500

I have tried a few times over the years to get MESS up and running.  Everytime i try, I get frustrated and quit and curse MESS and the horse it rode in on.  (jk Michael.  Hehe)

I am at the MESS homepage right now and I'm looking at the newest version... In the DL section, there are "binaries" and "source".  

DLing both of these gives me a bunch of stuff I can't use (or don't know how to use) and I'm sitting here scratching my head.  I'm positive I'm just a moron, but I'm wanting to start working with Forth+ in Geneve emulation and I can't get MESS to work for me.  Once I DO get it up and running, how do I load from disk?  

Forgive the elementary nature of my questions--- I've tried for about 5 years to get MESS going (mostly on my old Mac) and had NO SUCCESS.  Thanks in advance for your help

Firebrandmusic.net

---

From: Gregory McGill <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2011 18:26:40 -0800

Are you installing on a mac this time? Or Pc?

Basically on the PC you get a zip file, you unizip it somewhere, me I like
C:\mess as it's easy to find..  then you run the mess gui from within that
dir. messui.exe i think it is..  that gives you a point and click
interface..  Or you can run the mess exe from the commandline with the
computer name etc..  mess ti99-4a

you need the roms for the 4/a or geneve or whatever system you want, they
are in the ftp.whtech.com under mess if you don't have them

On the mac and linux its more complex.

Greg

On Thu, Feb 24, 2011 at 5:59 PM, Owen <[email-masked]> wrote:

>
>
> I have tried a few times over the years to get MESS up and running.
> Everytime i try, I get frustrated and quit and curse MESS and the horse it
> rode in on. (jk Michael. Hehe)
>
> I am at the MESS homepage right now and I'm looking at the newest
> version... In the DL section, there are "binaries" and "source".
>
> DLing both of these gives me a bunch of stuff I can't use (or don't know
> how to use) and I'm sitting here scratching my head. I'm positive I'm just a
> moron, but I'm wanting to start working with Forth+ in Geneve emulation and
> I can't get MESS to work for me. Once I DO get it up and running, how do I
> load from disk?
>
> Forgive the elementary nature of my questions--- I've tried for about 5
> years to get MESS going (mostly on my old Mac) and had NO SUCCESS. Thanks in
> advance for your help
>
> Firebrandmusic.net
>
>  
>

---

From: Owen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2011 21:26:54 -0500

I got it to open up now, but I have no system roms... Reading the FAQ, but the helpfile seems to be broken--- 

Firebrandmusic.net

---

From: Gregory McGill <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2011 18:31:15 -0800

http://mess.slor.net/   mess roms stick them in /mess/roms

<http://mess.slor.net/>

---

From: Owen <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2011 21:35:55 -0500

I'll start DLing stuff again.  I remember trying this last year and deleting everything... Never figured out how to load the ROMs into MESS or how to operate disk systems... It just seemed like a ton of configuring and maneuvering to run an emulator.  I ended up DLing all the systems I wanted in their stand-alone glory... Classic99, RockNES, ZSNES, etc... Double click, done.  Maybe I'm just technically inept and have no patience.

Firebrandmusic.net

On Feb 24, 2011, at 9:26 PM, Gregory McGill <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Basically on the PC you get a zip file, you unizip it somewhere, me I like C:\mess as it's easy to find..  then you run the mess gui from within that dir. messui.exe i think it is..  that gives you a point and click interface..  Or you can run the mess exe from the commandline with the computer name etc..  mess ti99-4a       
> 
> you need the roms for the 4/a or geneve or whatever system you want, they are in the ftp.whtech.com under mess if you don't have them
>

---

From: fdos <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2011 21:08:53 -0700

Owen,

Mess is by necessity complex as it supports many, many computer and game 
machine platforms.  And to avoid copy righted ROM code they don't 
provide them, so the user has to provide them and all necessary 
configuration requirements.  You will also notice that there are more 
than one TI-99/4 and TI-99/4A available which require specific ROMs and 
different setups.  Therefore it should be simpler for you to setup a 
9640 Geneve than a specific TI-99/4A.

One does have to select the EPROM (easy), and FDC or HFDC (easy) as 
there is a hard disk image file on WHTECH with lots of goodies and 
should be setup to boot MDOS 6.50.  Some MDOS applications require 
Beery's WIN-DRIVE as it provides simple i/o capabilities for the MDOS 
programmer.  Forth+ 1.01 does not require WIN-DRIVE, but I always load 
it for the other apps that I have.

I would suggest you download MESS 0.137 which will keep you out of the 
GenMod non-GenMod debate, but you will have a 2MB Geneve that works, but 
is not exactly like the real thing.  Once you unzip the download and 
have the MESS folder installed I can supply you with several sub-folders 
with the necessary binaries for the Geneve, and a configuration file 
that works with the UI.  You will need to download the hard drive 
image.chd and some of the obvious v9t9.dsk images.  This should simplify 
the install & setup process for you.

Keep us posted as to your progress.

Bill S

-- 
Bill R Sullivan (FDOS)
Go Forth+ or X4th99

---

From: Owen <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 00:00:36 -0500

Thanks Bill and Tursi... I remember now why I gave up on this more than once.  I run several emulators on my PC right now:

Classic99 (obvious)
RockNes (NES)
ZSNES (super NES)
Eighty-One (Jupiter Ace and Spectrum)
DOSBox (DOS)

And a few others...

It would be nice to get MESS up and running--- but I'm just not sure I want to go through all the hassle.  It's really alot of work--- probably not for some, but in my case--- it's proving to be "not-worth-it".  Although, I would love to have a better Jupiter Ace emulator--- Geneve too.  :)

Firebrandmusic.net

---

From: "Michael Zapf" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 09:58:36 -0000

> On the mac and linux its more complex.

Because you have to build it before using, yes. But not while using. I'm much quicker with the command line than with the graphical messui, so I just don't miss it.

./mess ti99_4ae -cart1 modules/cartridges/editorassembler.rpk -flop1 utils.dsk -flop2 mydisk.dsk

put this in a script file ti99ea and there you go. 

However, I admit there are really two worlds here. Me, I just CANNOT work without a command line, and surely not because of some dark affections.

The bash is definitely the program that is the tool most frequently used by me - by far. I certainly have my graphical desktop (KDE), but I only launch the "big" ones (Firefox, Thunderbird, VirtualBox, Doom3 etc.) by mouse click. 

So, by writing script files I really don't experience anything like a complex usage in Linux. But I acknowledge there's a big trench that one has to cross before, somehow, sometime.

Michael

---

From: "Michael Zapf" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 10:04:35 -0000

Hi Bill,

> I would suggest you download MESS 0.137 which will keep you out of 
> the  GenMod non-GenMod debate, but you will have a 2MB Geneve that 
> works, but is not exactly like the real thing. 

I believe those things have been sorted out in the meantime. 0.142 should be OK (as soon as it becomes available).

@Beery: MEMTEST 1.0 with Genmod gives me BC as the only partial page now. Should be correct, as I think. Do you have a configuration where other pages are white?

(You should download the latest nightly build; probably the version you have does not contain the recent fixes.)

michael

---

From: Tony Knerr <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 05:16:17 -0500

I've seen Greg and Bill both mention WIN-DRIVE now and am curious.
Can someone provide a little info/background on what this is and what it 
does?

Thanks,

Tony

On 2/24/2011 11:08 PM, fdos wrote:
> it for the other apps that I have. ...
>

---

From: Owen Brand <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 14:39:40 -0500

okay... DLed the roms for the Jupiter Ace... as a tester.  I created a
folder inside my "MESS" folder called "roms".  Still can't run it.  Is there
a subdir in C:\ somewhere?  I'll keep looking and trying.

---

From: Owen Brand <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 15:11:52 -0500

OKay... here's path for my system roms:

C:\mess\roms

I've pointed mess to the folder location.  Tried to run the Geneve and the
Jupiter Ace and it says I'm missing the system roms.  I can physically SEE
the roms in the proper location, so I KNOW they're there.  Both of these
systems have been proven to run in the past for other users, so I'm totally
out of ideas now.

On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 2:39 PM, Owen Brand <[email-masked]> wrote:

>>> > DLing both of these gives me a bunch of stuff I can't use (or don't
>>> know how to use) and I'm sitting here scratching my head. I'm positive I'm
>>> just a moron, but I'm wanting to start working with Forth+ in Geneve
>>> emulation and I can't get MESS to work for me. Once I DO get it up and
>>> running, how do I load from disk?
>>> >

---

From: Tony Knerr <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 16:03:18 -0500

You didn't unpack the zip files, did you?
Leave them zipped.

For the Geneve, you should have:
C:\mess\roms\geneve3.zip

If you're using messui.exe, scroll down to Geneve 9640 and highlight it 
by clicking on it.
Right click on it, click audit, and the Geneve properties box will come up.
'ROM check:' should indicate 'passed'.

Tell us what you have.

Tony

On 2/25/2011 3:11 PM, Owen Brand wrote:
> I've pointed mess to the folder location.  Tried to run the Geneve and 
> the Jupiter Ace and it says I'm missing the system roms.  I can 
> physically SEE the roms in the proper location, so I KNOW they're 
> there.  Both of these systems have been proven to run in the past for 
> other users, so I'm totally out of ideas now.
>
> On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 2:39 PM, Owen Brand <[email-masked] 
> <mailto:[email-masked]>> wrote:
>
>     okay... DLed the roms for the Jupiter Ace... as a tester.  I
>     created a folder inside my "MESS" folder called "roms".  Still
>     can't run it.  Is there a subdir in C:\ somewhere?  I'll keep
>     looking and trying.
>

---

From: Tony Knerr <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 16:12:33 -0500

I don't know how that 3 got in there, it's supposed to be:
C:\mess\roms\geneve.zip

Tony

---

From: Gregory McGill <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 13:52:03 -0800

hopefully you left the zip's intact.. if you unzipped you would need an
additional folder \mess\roms\geneve\ but the zip is more efficient

G

On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 12:11 PM, Owen Brand <[email-masked]> wrote:

> On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 2:39 PM, Owen Brand <[email-masked]>wrote:
>
>>>> > Forgive the elementary nature of my questions--- I've tried for about
>>>> 5 years to get MESS going (mostly on my old Mac) and had NO SUCCESS. Thanks
>>>> in advance for your help
>>>> >
>>>> >
>>>> >
>>>> > Firebrandmusic.net
>>>> >
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>  
>

---

From: "Beery" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 02:00:27 -0000

I'll have to wait till the next build.  The current for 2/23 will not unzip.

If I don't get it tomorrow, then chances are it will be mid next week before I can do any testing as I will be traveling for business.  Fireschool training at Texas A&M for my workplace.

Beery

---

From: "Beery" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 02:01:55 -0000

It installs the Windows XOP driver that an application could use without installing the Windows program I wrote years ago.

Beery

---

From: Owen Brand <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 00:35:41 -0500

ROM check passed... I got the swan on the screen, but it keeps telling me
that no disk is installed.  I guess now's the time to figure out how to do
this.  =)  Seeing the swan was pretty cool, I have to admit.

On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 9:01 PM, Beery <[email-masked]> wrote:

>
>
> It installs the Windows XOP driver that an application could use without
> installing the Windows program I wrote years ago.
>
> Beery
>
>

---

From: Owen Brand <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 00:42:08 -0500

Bill, is this the location of your Forth work?  There are only 3 files
here...

4THDOC1A
4THDOC1B
4THPGM10

ftp://ftp.whtech.com/geneve/mdos/forth/
Wondering what kind of disk I need to run this system and how to set up my
ROM directory.  Thanks

---

From: Gregory McGill <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 23:55:20 -0800

you need a hd image to link to that emulation, once its running you can add
it, or do it from the gui by selecting it in the software section

---

From: Owen <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 02:59:23 -0500

HD image.... Okay-- I'm not 100% sure how to work that.  :)

Forgive me--- MESS newbie

Firebrandmusic.net

On Feb 26, 2011, at 2:55 AM, Gregory McGill <[email-masked]> wrote:

> you need a hd image to link to that emulation, once its running you can add it, or do it from the gui by selecting it in the software section
> 
> 
> 
> ROM check passed... I got the swan on the screen, but it keeps telling me that no disk is installed.  I guess now's the time to figure out how to do this.  =)  Seeing the swan was pretty cool, I have to admit.
> 
> 
>

---

From: fdos <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 01:57:32 -0700

Owen,

I would think you would be highly motivated to learn the ins & outs of 
MESS & MAME considering all the different computer and arcade type games 
that would be available to you.

However, the Geneve emulator is the reason I became involved with MESS 
as I was otherwise satisfied with PC99, and my DOS command line 
abilities are intact from DOS 3.2 days ~ 6.2 which is still installed on 
my two old TI Travelmate 4000E laptops along with Win3.11 for 
Workgroups.  The batteries are long dead, but both still boot from the 
power units--although the heavy dust layers have made them terribly 
slow. ;-)  Of course, PC99 is set up on my Win98SE/Win2K Pro dual boot 
TI peripheral PC.

Besides, the Geneve emulator will prepare you for life with the Geneve 2 
when it arrives.  In the meantime you can bed down with the most 
powerfully fun language available to our hobby machines; Forth+. :-)

Don't give up.  We will help you get there.

Bill S

On 2/24/2011 10:00 PM, Owen wrote:
> On Feb 24, 2011, at 11:08 PM, fdos<[email-masked]>  wrote:
>
>> Owen,
>>
>> the install&  setup process for you.
>>

-- 
Bill R Sullivan (FDOS)
Go Forth+ or X4th99

---

From: fdos <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 02:09:40 -0700

Yes Owen,

There are two for the 370+ page manual (Myword), and just one for the 
application.  They were compressed with ARCHIVER, so you can start 
learning how to use EXEC from MDOS to load & execute ARCHIVER.  If you 
grab the Beery Miller hard drive image on WHTECH there is a batch file 
in the BATCH folder to do this.

Other tools you will need in addetion to EXEC are Clint Pulley's DM & 
QDE which will allow you to EDIT a batch file right from within DM then 
return to DM.  Clint also has a MDOS front end to the TI assembler if 
you'rr interested.

Please don't start playing with ABASIC, as you can not port it to the 
TI, so don't even think about it.  Put Leo Brodie's THINKING FORTH book 
in front of you.  Sleep with it under your pillow at night.  You'll wake 
in the morning with an RPN mind hot to trot!  Go Forth+!

Bill S

On 2/25/2011 10:42 PM, Owen Brand wrote:
> On Thu, Feb 24, 2011 at 11:08 PM, fdos<[email-masked]>  wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> Owen,
>>

-- 
Bill R Sullivan (FDOS)
Go Forth+ or X4th99

---

From: Tony Knerr <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 05:50:52 -0500

Well, that's a start. Windows program?
Is that a replacement for MDOS, or does
it 'ride on top' of MDOS like the original PC Windows?
Is this a commercial product, is it still available,
is there any documentation anywhere?

Odd that I haven't heard of this in 15+ years of Geneveing.

Tony

On 2/25/2011 9:01 PM, Beery wrote:
>
> It installs the Windows XOP driver that an application could use 
> without installing the Windows program I wrote years ago.
>
> Beery
>

---

From: "Michael Zapf" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 13:09:05 -0000

> you need a hd image to link to that emulation, once its running 
> you can add it, or do it from the gui by selecting it in the 
> software section

Hard disk is nice to have, but not required to boot the Geneve. You just need a floppy disk image with SYSTEM/SYS. (I noticed it requires LOAD/SYS as well, but I forgot the reason.)

Look into the files section; I uploaded a boot disk (boot65.dsk). Mount the image in the picker on the first drive. On the command line one would use -flop1 boot65.dsk

Michael

---

From: Tony Knerr <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 08:25:57 -0500

LOAD/SYS is required to boot from a device connected to the HFDC.
There was not enough room in the Geneve Eprom for all the code necessary 
for this,
so the Eprom code looks for an image file called LOAD/SYS on a device
called DSK1., and executes that code. The LOAD/SYS program does all the 
hard work
of determining the device, reading the sectors of the SYSTEM/SYS file, 
and loading
them into the proper places of the Geneve's memory. Then it starts up MDOS.
SCSI/SYS does the same thing with the SCSI card, and it's code is based 
on LOAD/SYS.

Tony

On 2/26/2011 8:09 AM, Michael Zapf wrote:
> Hard disk is nice to have, but not required to boot the Geneve. You 
> just need a floppy disk image with SYSTEM/SYS. (I noticed it requires 
> LOAD/SYS as well, but I forgot the reason.)
>
> Look into the files section; I uploaded a boot disk (boot65.dsk). 
> Mount the image in the picker on the first drive. On the command line 
> one would use -flop1 boot65.dsk
>
> Michael
>

---

From: fdos <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 08:50:07 -0700

Tony,

Beery should reply to this as it is his creation.  I'll just try to 
provide some high lights.

There were two releases of Windows.  I have both, along with most all of 
the WIN-DRIVE releases including the last one or two (3.1 was the very 
last one) that were modified by Al Beard to provide specific support for 
his GenBench Shell application.

Windows was primarily a multi-tasking platform for setting up different 
MDOS applications (to some degree even EA5 programs via EXEC) in 
separate windows allowing the user to switch back and forth between all 
the applications setup.  For the best results the application had to 
adhere to the windows conventions which provided the multi-tasking 
environment.  It meant certain areas of application memory were reserved 
for windows, and could not be used by the application except as 
specified by windows.

This meant that the application became windows dependent and could not 
execute from the MDOS CLI.  To accommodate this a single-task driver 
(WIN-DRIVE) was included with windows, and could be provided with the 
application.  Like Bruce Hellstrom's Mouse driver, it was a TSR 
(Terminate and Stay Resident task) that should be included in one's 
AUTOEXEC file, so it would be installed, ready and available each time 
MDOS was booted, for any application that required single-tasking 
windows support.

That's it in a nut shell.

Bill S

-- 
Bill R Sullivan (FDOS)
Go Forth+ or X4th99

---

From: Tony Knerr <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 12:05:22 -0500

Thanks, Bill.

So as I understand it, I could have for example Directory Manager and
Advanced Basic both loaded in memory at the same time, and instantly
switch between them without reloading? Sounds pretty cool if I'm correct
in my assumption.

That's sort of like my GPL resident version of MDOS where one can jump
into GPL and back to MDOS without having to reload GPL each time.
I wonder if WIN-DRIVE works with MDOS v2.71? That would be an
interesting setup - Instant Anything. :)

Tony

On 2/26/2011 10:50 AM, fdos wrote:
> provide some high lights. ...
>

---

From: fdos <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 10:31:47 -0700

Tony,

Maybe!  AFAIK neither DM or ABASIC were written to take advantage of 
Windows, but they may work if they don't use any of the Windows reserved 
memory in a bad way.  What does that mean?

Take for instance Forth+: on the most part it will work, but sometimes 
you'll get odd looking characters wondering around the screen.  This 
means the application is using reserved memory in a disturbing way, but 
not so as to crash Forth+ or Windows.

You'll just have to find out on a trial basis.  Usually, small 
applications won't use any of the reserved memory for any purpose and 
work just fine.

Bill S

-- 
Bill R Sullivan (FDOS)
Go Forth+ or X4th99

---

From: Insane Multitasker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 14:15:09 -0600

Reminds me of something I ran across. 
 
The CLI tasks, even when dormant, consume a short time testing whether or not they should run. Or maybe more accurately the OS scheduler is testing.  Regardless, when I ported Tursi's EPSGMOD player demo to the Geneve, there were times when the songs played slightly slower than usual.  I came to realize this occurred when I was launching the program from DM (or similar) and even though DM was "asleep" there was barely perceptible slowdown. I don't recall if chaining programs (ie, launching DM from itself a dew times) increases the slowness factor.  Nor do I know if this shows up in MESS; I was doing my work on the real thing.
 
:)

To: [email-masked]
From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 12:05:22 -0500
Subject: Re: [TI994A] Re: MESS mess

Thanks, Bill.

Tony

Tony,

---

From: "Beery" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 22:15:06 -0000

It was released into the public domain a long time ago along with the source.  It was one of my first serious programming efforts on the Geneve.  It's sorta like the very old windows you referenced.  Al Beard did something with the windows driver I think was a bit better.

Beery

---

From: "Beery" <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 22:17:01 -0000

Bill's review was correct.  To do that, you had to have enough free memory to run both programs.  No memory swapping.

Beery