On Oct 21, 7:23*am, Udo Munk wrote:
> available athttp://www.unix4fun.org/z80pack/
>
> This version is integrated with John Kichury's frontpanel library, final
> release v2.0, as available at sourceforge.

Udo, thanks for all the great work you are putting into this project.
There are many bits and pieces floating around, but filtering out the
gems and packaging things the way you do really lowers the barrier to
getting an emulation running something interesting.

John's front panel interface is really stunning too.

On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 07:38:57 -0700, frustum@pacbell.net wrote:

> On Oct 21, 7:23*am, Udo Munk wrote:
>> available athttp://www.unix4fun.org/z80pack/
>>
>> This version is integrated with John Kichury's frontpanel library, final
>> release v2.0, as available at sourceforge.
>
> Udo, thanks for all the great work you are putting into this project.

You are welcome. I enjoy it my self a lot, I like this kind of
programming.

> There are many bits and pieces floating around, but filtering out the
> gems and packaging things the way you do really lowers the barrier to
> getting an emulation running something interesting.

I'm trying to preserve as much of the old software I loved to use way back
then as I can. I believe that building emulations that can run this
software without fiddling with rare parts is a good way to archive this.
Also I hope that younger generations enjoy playing with this machines,
much could be learned because this machines are relative simple to
understand, and almost no hardware kits to play with are available
nowadays.

> John's front panel interface is really stunning too.

Definitely. And as a programmer I can say it is a pleasure to use such a
well designed library in some project.

Udo Munk
--
The real fun is building it and then using it...

Udo Munk ha scritto:

> available at http://www.unix4fun.org/z80pack/

I can point out that there are no top level makefile; not much a problem
for the standard hacker, in few minutes one get what directory should be
compiled first, but for the general (l)user, isn't so easy (aside that
Z80pack isn't intended for general users...)

Hope to have given an useful suggestion,
Dott. Piergiorgio.

P.s. the blinkenlighten emulation is *really* cool.... once added to
SIMH will give the actual "programming environment" of 1950s and 1960s
dinos

On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:06:03 +0200, dott.Piergiorgio wrote:

> Udo Munk ha scritto:
>
>> available at http://www.unix4fun.org/z80pack/
>
> I can point out that there are no top level makefile; not much a problem
> for the standard hacker, in few minutes one get what directory should be
> compiled first, but for the general (l)user, isn't so easy (aside that
> Z80pack isn't intended for general users...)

I could be easier if one would read the included build instructions ;-)
I still need to update the web site tho, right now it probably requires a
little bit of patience which 'general users' don't have anyway.

> Hope to have given an useful suggestion,
> Dott. Piergiorgio.

Yes, thank you, I'll see what I can do about this for the next release.

> P.s. the blinkenlighten emulation is *really* cool.... once added to
> SIMH will give the actual "programming environment" of 1950s and 1960s
> dinos

I hope it will motivate others to work on similar things, this stuff shows
that it can be done and that the result is *really* cool.

Udo Munk
--
The real fun is building it and then using it...

Udo Munk ha scritto:
> On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:06:03 +0200, dott.Piergiorgio wrote:

>> I can point out that there are no top level makefile; not much a problem
>> for the standard hacker, in few minutes one get what directory should be
>> compiled first, but for the general (l)user, isn't so easy (aside that
>> Z80pack isn't intended for general users...)
>
> I could be easier if one would read the included build instructions ;-)

Agree on this, but I can suggest that README-frontpanel.txt as filename
don't suggest "compiling instruction here" ?

> I still need to update the web site tho, right now it probably requires a
> little bit of patience which 'general users' don't have anyway.

Indeed. but at least pointing to the DL directory tree helps, if one
understand what is what (as I and, I guess, everyone who follow c.o.cpm )


>> P.s. the blinkenlighten emulation is *really* cool.... once added to
>> SIMH will give the actual "programming environment" of 1950s and 1960s
>> dinos
>
> I hope it will motivate others to work on similar things, this stuff shows
> that it can be done and that the result is *really* cool.

another suggestion I can do is studying the sources of the various
electronic circuit simulation/analysis programs, esp. the part whose
parse the circuit schematics, whose I surmise can give the insights
needed for extending the "programming enviroment" emulation back to
1930s & 1940s (of course I refer to the various wiring panels used in
very early computers, for example the IBM 60x & 40x )

Best regards from Italy,
Dott. Piergiorgio.

On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:27:00 +0200, Udo Munk wrote:

> On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:06:03 +0200, dott.Piergiorgio wrote:
>
>> Udo Munk ha scritto:
>>
>>> available at http://www.unix4fun.org/z80pack/
>>
>> I can point out that there are no top level makefile; not much a problem
>> for the standard hacker, in few minutes one get what directory should be
>> compiled first, but for the general (l)user, isn't so easy (aside that
>> Z80pack isn't intended for general users...)
>
> I could be easier if one would read the included build instructions ;-)
......
......
After you build the frontpanel based machines following the instructions
in ~/z80pack-1.17/doc/README-frontpanel.txt...

>> P.s. the blinkenlighten emulation is *really* cool.... once added to
>> SIMH will give the actual "programming environment" of 1950s and 1960s
>> dinos

try the following for some interesting blinkenlights:

Run the IMSAI emulation and load the 8K BASIC interpreter with:
imsaisim -xbasic8k.hex

Before entering any program you first need to run the command NEW, else
the BASIC interpreters will destroy them self, see manual.

Then enter this short program:
NEW
10 FOR I=1 TO 10
20 PRINT SIN(I); COS(I)
30 NEXT I
RUN

Another one:
NEW
10 FOR I=255 TO 0 STEP -1
20 OUT 255,I
30 NEXT I
RUN

Enjoy,
Udo Munk
--
The real fun is building it and then using it...

On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:52:34 +0200, dott.Piergiorgio wrote:

> Udo Munk ha scritto:
>> On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 20:06:03 +0200, dott.Piergiorgio wrote:
>
>>> I can point out that there are no top level makefile; not much a problem
>>> for the standard hacker, in few minutes one get what directory should be
>>> compiled first, but for the general (l)user, isn't so easy (aside that
>>> Z80pack isn't intended for general users...)
>>
>> I could be easier if one would read the included build instructions ;-)
>
> Agree on this, but I can suggest that README-frontpanel.txt as filename
> don't suggest "compiling instruction here" ?

Yes you are right, the filename doesn't suggest this, I'll write some
better instructions for the next release.

>> I still need to update the web site tho, right now it probably requires
>> a little bit of patience which 'general users' don't have anyway.
>
> Indeed. but at least pointing to the DL directory tree helps, if one
> understand what is what (as I and, I guess, everyone who follow c.o.cpm
> )

Yep, please have a look at the doc directory and read the .txt files
included there.

>>> P.s. the blinkenlighten emulation is *really* cool.... once added to
>>> SIMH will give the actual "programming environment" of 1950s and 1960s
>>> dinos
>>
>> I hope it will motivate others to work on similar things, this stuff
>> shows that it can be done and that the result is *really* cool.
>
> another suggestion I can do is studying the sources of the various
> electronic circuit simulation/analysis programs, esp. the part whose
> parse the circuit schematics, whose I surmise can give the insights
> needed for extending the "programming enviroment" emulation back to
> 1930s & 1940s (of course I refer to the various wiring panels used in
> very early computers, for example the IBM 60x & 40x )

As long as it is digital and flips bits from 0 to 1 and from 1 to 0 it
can be done on 21s century equipment, no problem. Another thing are analog
computers, those probably are harder to emulate exactly.

> Best regards from Italy,
> Dott. Piergiorgio.

Udo Munk
--
The real fun is building it and then using it...

Hello Udo,

On Tue, 21 Oct 2008 14:23:12 +0200, Udo Munk wrote:

>available at http://www.unix4fun.org/z80pack/

Thanks for your Info.

Rolf

On Oct 21, 2:06*pm, "dott.Piergiorgio"
wrote:
> Udo Munk ha scritto:
>
> > available athttp://www.unix4fun.org/z80pack/
>
> I can point out that there are no top level makefile; not much a problem
> for the standard hacker, in few minutes one get what directory should be
> compiled first, but for the general (l)user, isn't so easy (aside that
> Z80pack isn't intended for general users...)
>
> Hope to have given an useful suggestion,
> Dott. Piergiorgio.
>
> P.s. the blinkenlighten emulation is *really* cool.... once added to
> SIMH will give the actual "programming environment" of 1950s and 1960s
> dinos

The FrontPanel library is partly integrated with SIMH already.
Download the whole package from
http://sourceforge.net/projects/frontpanel/ which has a modified
version of SIMH. Siimulations are included with the package for the
following systems:

IMSAI 2D and 3D
Altair
DCC D-116
Data General Nova 1200, Nova3

I say "partly integrated" because full switch functionality isn't
there and will take some simh code restructuring to do so. I added a
new "panel" command which will enable/disable the front panel. Type
"help panel" in the SIMH console for details.

The IMSAI and Altair simulation that Udo provided has accurate front
panel switch operation.

- John Kicury

On Oct 21, 2:06 pm, "dott.Piergiorgio"
wrote:
> Udo Munk ha scritto:
>
> > available athttp://www.unix4fun.org/z80pack/
>
> Hope to have given an useful suggestion,
> Dott. Piergiorgio.
>
> P.s. the blinkenlighten emulation is *really* cool.... once added to
> SIMH will give the actual "programming environment" of 1950s and 1960s
> dinos

The FrontPanel library is already partly integrated with SIMH with a
new “panel” command attaching front panels. Download the package from
http://sourceforge.net/projects/frontpanel/ and the included
simulations for the following systems are done with a modified version
of SIMH.

Altair
IMSAI 2D and 3D versions
Data General Nova 1200 and Nova 3
Digital Computer Controls DCC-D116

Screenshots are at http://sourceforge.net/project/scree...roup_id=238132

I say “partly integrated” because all of the front panel switch
functions are not yet fully functional, but the lights are pretty
accurate when instructions are executing. More work is needed for full
integration.

Apologies if this post is a duplicate as I didn’t see it appear in my
reader after 24 hours.

Regards,

John Kichury