Download PolyLetter 1987 - PolyMorphic

PolyLetter 8705
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ETX, it sends ACK Cackno"ledgel back to the Poly .
The Poly then sends another block of 255, etc_ The
only disadvantage to this method C"hich I used for
years until I s"itched to "hard"are handshaking") is
that you cannot take advantage of the larger memory
buffer often available on printers . My Diablo 1650,
for example, has a 2,000 byte memory, and often
small printing jobs can be completely dumped to my
pr i nter and I can get the computer back "hile the
printer is st ill plugging a"ay.
All Diablo printers I've ever "orked with will
work wi th the ETX/ACK protocol, usually without
hav i ng to do anyth i ng (though it's possible a switch
wi ll have to be setL
Most. if not all, Diablos
"ill also handle the DC1/DC3 CXon/Xoff) protocol.
but the Poly pr i nter driver "ill NOT handle DC1/DC3 .
Incidentally , the older versions of Poly Exec
(pr i or to Exec/83) have the ETX/ACK protocol but
" hardware handshaking " capability wasn't available
until Exec/83 . CNot true _ Poly has used CTS for
hard"are handshak i ng from day 1- -- Ed . l
2. Re : Use of a cassette tape for mass storage_
I have a cassette setup, but I can't imagine anyone
really fool i ng "ith it except to play .
The
" PolyPhase" system at 1200 baud is reasonably fast
(especially "hen compared to the "Kansas City
Standard " 300 baud format) but it has its problems,
too.
One of t he sign i ficant problems is that a fairly
h i gh grade cassette recorder is required .
PolyMorphic al"ays recommended the SuperScope Model
C 1 03 as i t "as one of the fe" "hich worked
cons i stently in PolyPhase _ Another problem is that
a tape recorded on one recorder may not play back on
another .
The most serious problem, though, is that if the
computer has the "Version 81" Poly ROMS installed,
the cassette handling routines aren't there.
FILMS .GO calls these ROM routines and, without them,
you're out of luck_ COn the other hand, I don't
know ho" many PolyOwners converted to the Version 81
ROMS . You can find out which ROMs you have by
go i ng into the front panel CCONTROL Z in enabled
model and entering L0439 . This is VERLOC CVERsion
LOCat i on) and the number displayed after the arrow
i s the version of the installed ROMs_)
Another way of using cassette tapes is to use
BASIC A01 and Exec/4D instead of FILMS.GO . There
are built-in cassette routines available there . I
believe you sti 11 have to have ROMs previous to
Version SL
3_ Re : Readability of PolyLetter.
The last i ssue was fairly readable cthough I
admit to be i ng an unreconstructed "letter quality
only" freakL My main suggestion for improvement of
readabi li ty i s that you put a blank line between
every par a graph _ This reduces the amount of
material wh ich can be published but what's there is
much more readable _ Best regards, -- Chuck
Thompson, Dallas, TX .
2
SEP/OCT 198 7
CI just checked out FILMS/3E " i th DisAsmb . GO .
FILMS/3E does NOT call the cassette rout i nes in the
ROMS . The "hole purpose of the program FILMS "as to
provide the tape handling routines wh i ch were
or iginally in the 4.0 mon i tor (part of PROMS version
75) but removed from later PROMS to make room for
the MS Dio code . FILMS does use a system locat ion
which is called by the Di o code, so there might
possibly be a conflict, although I didn't have an y
trouble reading a short tape and saving the file to
disk . The slow speed i s , i n my opinion, the "orst
disadvantage _ -- Ed . l
Dear Ralph
September 11. 1987
Just finished look i ng through PolyLetter 8704 and
am r espondring to your offer of StO for SORT .GO ,
check enclosed .
I note that the !A:SJ price list offers two (2)
sort programs, Qsrt and Hsrt that are overlays _ Al
Levy, in a recent conversation, and without
distinguishing which program he was referring to,
commented on "Ralph Kenyon's fast sort" . He seemed
to be impressed . How does SORT.GO relate to Qs r t or
Hsrt in speed or concept? I assume that in sorting
large files with long fixed-length records I would
have to create a special file of shorter i ndex
records, imbed the record number at the tail end,
use SORT to resequence the index records, and then
use the imbedded record numbers in the resequencing
index records to randomly access and copy the host
file records . Do you have any timing comparisons on
the three programs for, or would you estimate the
timess for , say, (500) SO-character records ; under
two conditions; first, of the host file be i ng fully
random, versus; two, having only 2% randomly
out-of-sequence?
In the latest PolyLetter, I especially appreciated
your article "CRASH!". Regarding the exchange of
views on SPELL, I am impressed with the cand id and
objective manner in which you Cand your predecessor
Bob Bybee) tell it like it is - - or at least as you
see it. This is a healthy and helpful environment
for everybody when and if issues can be freely
discussed and aired, in full context, without
insult. I appreciate it.
Ralph, can you help me with 8 11 replacement SSDD
drives? How about pressure pads, especially for 8 11 •
Do you have 8 11 disks available for sale? CSee Doug
Reaser's ad . -- Edl
My latest problem: the 8 11 drive-2 will not
respond to any call for a directory update - - not
from EDIT, COPY, or PACK . The screw drive will not
reverse . I restore operations by manually turning
back the screw . from then on it operates properly
with LIST, TYPE, PRINT , READ, etc . , so long as I
don't mess with the directory _ I have yet to
commence diagnosing by swapping units and cables
and boards . Thank God for the extra MS unit that Al
Levy recently provided me . -- Sincerely, -- J _ Ea rl
Gilbreath, Jr _, Savannah, GA .
CEarl, SORT.GO is different from HsrLOV and
Qsrt.OV_ SORT . GO reads variable length lines of
text from a text file and wr i tes them out in sorted