PET 4032 keyboard scanning problem / was Re: Anyone have an image of a Japanese PET chrgen ROM 901447-12?
6 Apr
2010
6 Apr
'10
12:40 a.m.
-----------------Original Message:
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 2010 16:28:58 -0700
From: Brent Hilpert <hilpert at cs.ubc.ca>
Subject: PET 4032 keyboard scanning problem / was Re: Anyone have an
image of a Japanese PET chrgen ROM 901447-12?
Speaking of early Commodore PETs, I have here a 4032 on which some of the keys
do not work. Some time ago I took a brief look at it and, as I recall,
concluded the problem was not the keyboard but rather something was messed up
with the scanning, something like not all columns/rows being scanned. I think
it was a 6821 or 6822 or some such doing the I/O, but the diagnosis was perhaps
more suggestive of something like a PROM bit failure causing the firmware
program to foreshorten the scan sequence.
Anyone have knowledge of a known failure mode of this sort with these machines?
--------------------Reply:
The most common problem is just oxidation and/or wear of the rubber 'contacts'
and the PCB grid; if you're lucky a good cleaning will clear it up, in case of bad
wear of the conductive pads you may have to recoat them with conductive paint
ot glue little pads of aluminum foil or aluminized mylar on to them.
Electronically they are a normal scanned matrix, driven by a 6520 PIA (UB12?)
and a muliplexer; if there is a problem there then it would most likely be with all
the keys in a certain row or column. I suppose it's possible, but I'd be very
surprised if it were a bad ROM.
Check the schematic and you should be able to jumper across the appropriate
keyboard lines to test all the rows and columns.
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/schematics/computers/pet/8032/803202…
6 Apr
6 Apr
12:37 p.m.
New subject: PET 4032 keyboard scanning problem / was Re:Anyone have an image of a Japanese PET chrgen ROM 901447-12?
M H Stein wrote:
-----------------Original Message:
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 2010 16:28:58 -0700
From: Brent Hilpert <hilpert at cs.ubc.ca>
Subject: PET 4032 keyboard scanning problem / was Re: Anyone have an
image of a Japanese PET chrgen ROM 901447-12?
Speaking of early Commodore PETs, I have here a 4032 on which some of the keys
do not work. Some time ago I took a brief look at it and, as I recall,
concluded the problem was not the keyboard but rather something was messed up
with the scanning, something like not all columns/rows being scanned. I think
it was a 6821 or 6822 or some such doing the I/O, but the diagnosis was perhaps
more suggestive of something like a PROM bit failure causing the firmware
program to foreshorten the scan sequence.
Anyone have knowledge of a known failure mode of this sort with these machines?
--------------------Reply:
The most common problem is just oxidation and/or wear of the rubber 'contacts'
and the PCB grid; if you're lucky a good cleaning will clear it up, in case of bad
wear of the conductive pads you may have to recoat them with conductive paint
ot glue little pads of aluminum foil or aluminized mylar on to them.
Electronically they are a normal scanned matrix, driven by a 6520 PIA (UB12?)
and a muliplexer; if there is a problem there then it would most likely be with all
the keys in a certain row or column. I suppose it's possible, but I'd be very
surprised if it were a bad ROM.
Check the schematic and you should be able to jumper across the appropriate
keyboard lines to test all the rows and columns.
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/schematics/computers/pet/8032/803202…
I had already checked the keyboard, it wasn't as simple as that.
Your mention of the multiplexor reminds me (I had forgotten and thought the
6520 lines drove the scan directly) that the binary scan count from the 6520 to
the multiplexor didn't seem to count high enough to do the full scan, more
suggestive of a program error.
It was a couple of years ago, and I didn't get through a full diagnosis.
I was asking in case there was a known problem with the PROMs failing and
producing random symptoms.
... pulled out my notes from 2004: I had scoped the lines from the 6520 to the
'145 1-of-10 decoder, the observed 4-bit scan sequence driving the 145 is
09ABCDEF0 rather than 0->9, so only 2 lines instead of 10 on one side of the
keyboard matrix are being scanned.
12:55 p.m.
New subject: PET 4032 keyboard scanning problem / was Re:Anyone have an image
... pulled out my notes from 2004: I had scoped the
lines from the 6520 to the
'145 1-of-10 decoder, the observed 4-bit scan sequence driving the 145 is
09ABCDEF0 rather than 0->9, so only 2 lines instead of 10 on one side of the
Hat it been 89ABCDEF8989ABCDEF... I would have guessed that the D input
was stuck highm possibly due to a defect in the PIA or a bad connection
(the PIA is socketed IIRC). Are you sure it's not this sequence?
keyboard matrix are being scanned.
-tony
2:25 p.m.
New subject: PET 4032 keyboard scanning problem / was Re:Anyone have an image
Tony Duell wrote:
I had scoped all 4 lines and determined the count sequence from the time
relationship of the pulses on those lines. While it is possible that on one of
those 4 lines I was somehow blind to the distinction between a pulse and a
constant high, it is highly unlikely. In this instance, the unlikely did not occur.
I also scoped the 10 active-low outputs from the 145 with a pull-up resistor
added because the outputs are OC and don't show their state well without. Only
2 go low (0 & 9).
The 6520 PIA is soldered in.
... pulled out my notes from 2004: I had scoped
the lines from the 6520 to the
'145 1-of-10 decoder, the observed 4-bit scan sequence driving the 145 is
09ABCDEF0 rather than 0->9, so only 2 lines instead of 10 on one side of the
keyboard matrix are being scanned.
Hat it been 89ABCDEF8989ABCDEF... I would have guessed that the D input
was stuck highm possibly due to a defect in the PIA or a bad connection
(the PIA is socketed IIRC). Are you sure it's not this sequence?
7 Apr
7 Apr
12:10 p.m.
New subject: PET 4032 keyboard scanning problem / was Re:Anyone have an image
I had scoped all 4 lines and determined the count
sequence from the time
relationship of the pulses on those lines. While it is possible that on one of
those 4 lines I was somehow blind to the distinction between a pulse and a
constant high, it is highly unlikely. In this instance, the unlikely did not occur.
A trick which I am sure you know, but it's worth mentioning in case
others don't is to apply a 'weak' 2.5V source to the scope probe (say
100k to +5V, 100k to ground. Any logic driver will override that and pull
high or low, but it will tell you the difference between high/low/floating.
If you are working on old TTL that often only went up to 2.5V or so on
the otuputs, then pick the resistors to get 1.5V or so on a floating signal
instead.
-tony
12:41 a.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/04/ibm-breaks-oss-patent-pr
omise-targets-mainframe-emulator.ars
It sounds like they're going after someone selling services (and running
IBM software) rather than the emu itself at the moment.
Antonio
5:35 a.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
Not surprising. It's another typical case of a company trying to profit
from another's turning the other cheek in good
faith toward the hobbyists.
-----Original Message-----
From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org]
On Behalf Of arcarlini at iee.org
Sent: Wednesday, April 07, 2010 2:41 AM
To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts'
Subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/04/ibm-breaks-oss-patent-pr
omise-targets-mainframe-emulator.ars
It sounds like they're going after someone selling services (and running
IBM software) rather than the emu itself at the moment.
Antonio
5:39 a.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
Be careful when choosing sides on this one. I read that the guy
running the services business tried to sue IBM first. IBM isn't firing
the first shot here, and someone (or several someones) is not telling
the whole story. I haven't looked into things too far yet.
On Apr 7, 2010, at 2:41 AM, <arcarlini at iee.org> wrote:
http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/04/ibm-breaks-oss-patent-pr
omise-targets-mainframe-emulator.ars
It sounds like they're going after someone selling services (and
running
IBM software) rather than the emu itself at the moment.
Antonio
8 Apr
8 Apr
11:43 a.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
arcarlini at iee.org wrote:
http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2010/04/ibm-breaks-oss-patent-pr
omise-targets-mainframe-emulator.ars
It sounds like they're going after someone selling services (and running
IBM software) rather than the emu itself at the moment.
It is important to observe that there is a huge distinction between
Hercules, an open-source project, and TurboHercules, a commercial entity
selling a commercial, non-open-source software package derived from
Hercules.
They're not yet "going after" anyone; so far they're only defending
their decision not to sell licenses to their proprietary operating
systems for use on TurboHercules' commercial, non-open-source version of
Hercules. The TurboHercules people wrote a snotty letter to IBM along
the lines of "nyah, nyah, we can use your processor architecture because
it isn't patented", and IBM pointed out that they do in fact have a
bunch of patents on it, which TurboHercules *might* be infringing.
IBM hasn't actually outright threatened or sued anyone yet, though the
implication is that if TurboHercules really goes forward with suing IBM
in the EU, then IBM may sue TurboHercules for patent infringement.
IBM hasn't said anything about suing the Hercules developers. IBM in
the past has offered some kind of covenant not to sue open source
projects for use of a particular set of IBM patents, which may include
some but not all of the patents they listed in their reply to TurboHercules.
Anyhow, I'm not a lawyer, and this is just my take on it after looking
into it relatively briefly.
Eric
12:21 p.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
Eric Smith wrote:
It is important to observe that there is a huge
distinction between
Hercules, an open-source project, and TurboHercules, a commercial entity
selling a commercial, non-open-source software package derived from
Hercules.
Not only that, but Hercules (the open source) is specifically used with
IBM operating systems for which licensing isn't commercial. (Read:
older stuff) TurboHercules is trying to provide alternate means of
running IBM's *current* software. One is attacking IBM's bottom line,
and one isn't. TurboHercules is trying to take advantage of IBM's
generosity in allowing the open source community use of its patents to
attack IBM's business.
Peace... Sridhar
12:41 p.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
I figured something like that was going on. I smelled a rat when I saw
it on slashdot. It didn't make any sense. Thanks for posting.
On Apr 8, 2010, at 2:21 PM, Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> wrote:
Eric Smith wrote:
It is important to observe that there is a huge
distinction between
Hercules, an open-source project, and TurboHercules, a commercial
entity
selling a commercial, non-open-source software package derived from
Hercules.
Not only that, but Hercules (the open source) is specifically used
with IBM operating systems for which licensing isn't commercial.
(Read: older stuff) TurboHercules is trying to provide alternate
means of running IBM's *current* software. One is attacking IBM's
bottom line, and one isn't. TurboHercules is trying to take
advantage of IBM's generosity in allowing the open source community
use of its patents to attack IBM's business.
Peace... Sridhar 
2:05 p.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
On 4/8/2010 12:41 PM, Daniel Seagraves wrote:
I figured something like that was going on. I smelled
a rat when I saw
it on slashdot. It didn't make any sense. Thanks for posting.
On Apr 8, 2010, at 2:21 PM, Sridhar Ayengar <ploopster at gmail.com> wrote:
Turbohercules has as one its major participants Roger Bowler. TH is not
asking to steal or take advantage of anything for free. All they are
asking is that IBM grant a license (not free) to run on their
implementation (non ibm Z series hardware, but quite possibly IBM
hardware base) for a narrow business case. Others would have to proceed
into other areas on their own dime at their own risk.
So the latter sentence is a bit of a stretch to understand. The
Hercules community is certainly not out to piss off IBM as you said in
the first part of your statement, but it is not accurate to portray them
as the other effort, PSI.
Apologies to the group for this posting, but I had to reply to what
sounds a bit distorted. Much better place for this comment would be
over on the Hercules-advocacy group on yahoo, won't comment again on
this here.
I really like Hercules as it hits the center of what my main interest is
in classic computing these days, emulations, and vintage software. I
certainly hope this does not turn out to be a misstep that hits Hercules
with a backlash from IBM.
Jim
Eric Smith wrote:
It is important to observe that there is a huge
distinction between
Hercules, an open-source project, and TurboHercules, a commercial
entity
selling a commercial, non-open-source software package derived from
Hercules.
Not only that, but Hercules (the open source) is specifically used
with IBM operating systems for which licensing isn't commercial.
(Read: older stuff) TurboHercules is trying to provide alternate
means of running IBM's *current* software. One is attacking IBM's
bottom line, and one isn't. TurboHercules is trying to take
advantage of IBM's generosity in allowing the open source community
use of its patents to attack IBM's business.
Peace... Sridhar 
12:44 p.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
On Thu, 2010-04-08 at 12:43 -0600, Eric Smith wrote:
The TurboHercules people wrote a snotty letter to IBM
along
the lines of "nyah, nyah, we can use your processor architecture because
it isn't patented", and IBM pointed out that they do in fact have a
bunch of patents on it, which TurboHercules *might* be infringing.
And I think this is the key here. As soon as IBM replied it got covered
on a pile of open source websites as "IBM hates open source" which
seemed a bit fishy considering how much money they make from it...
1:20 p.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
On 4/8/10 2:44 PM, Brian Wheeler wrote:
On Thu, 2010-04-08 at 12:43 -0600, Eric Smith wrote:
s/make from it/pour into it/
Let the flames begin.... ;)
It's pretty interesting to look at IBM's participation in "the
opensource community" in the late '90s and early 2K, and then contrast
that with Sun's so-called Linux initiative from the same period.
Anybody remember "lxrun"? Sun basically said "We support Linux!
Look! You can run Linux binaries on Solaris! <mumble>sometimes. under
certain conditions</mumble>" and waited for the OSS community to start
spending money on Sun hardware & software and port their code to Solaris.
OTOH, IBM spent huge money on Linux for many years before they saw a
dime out of it. In the '90s, a lot of the developers at the Austin
campus released a crapload of kernel code under their own names because
IBM Legal was so leery of the GPL. A significant portion of the Linux
kernel was written by IBM, sometimes officially and often not. Same for
apache, as far as that goes. And then there's Hercules, and and and.
IBM wanted, and wants, to sell some very high-end software for Linux
platforms. They recognized the need for professional development to
help make the platform robust enough to justify it, so they jumped in
with both feet.
Doc
The TurboHercules people wrote a snotty letter to
IBM along
the lines of "nyah, nyah, we can use your processor architecture because
it isn't patented", and IBM pointed out that they do in fact have a
bunch of patents on it, which TurboHercules *might* be infringing.
And I think this is the key here. As soon as IBM replied it got covered
on a pile of open source websites as "IBM hates open source" which
seemed a bit fishy considering how much money they make from it...
1:59 p.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
On Thu, 2010-04-08 at 15:20 -0500, Doc Shipley wrote:
On 4/8/10 2:44 PM, Brian Wheeler wrote:
I think they do make make money from it.
On Thu, 2010-04-08 at 12:43 -0600, Eric Smith
wrote:
s/make from it/pour into it/
Let the flames begin.... ;)
The TurboHercules people wrote a snotty letter to
IBM along
the lines of "nyah, nyah, we can use your processor architecture because
it isn't patented", and IBM pointed out that they do in fact have a
bunch of patents on it, which TurboHercules *might* be infringing.
And I think this is the key here. As soon as IBM replied it got covered
on a pile of open source websites as "IBM hates open source" which
seemed a bit fishy considering how much money they make from it... OTOH, IBM spent huge money on Linux for many years
before they saw a
dime out of it. In the '90s, a lot of the developers at the Austin
campus released a crapload of kernel code under their own names because
IBM Legal was so leery of the GPL. A significant portion of the Linux
kernel was written by IBM, sometimes officially and often not. Same for
apache, as far as that goes. And then there's Hercules, and and and.
I don't know if I'd call it a significant portion, but there is a lot of
IBM code in there. If it were significantly IBM I'm sure some waning
unix company would have sued them by now :)
2:11 p.m.
New subject: Hercules (IBM emulator) under threat?
On 4/8/10 3:59 PM, Brian Wheeler wrote:
On Thu, 2010-04-08 at 15:20 -0500, Doc Shipley wrote:
Oh, they do, no doubt. Whether total return has matched total
investment yet, I don't know.
Doc
On 4/8/10 2:44 PM, Brian Wheeler wrote:
I think they do make make money from it. On Thu, 2010-04-08 at 12:43 -0600, Eric Smith
wrote:
s/make from it/pour into it/
Let the flames begin.... ;)
The TurboHercules people wrote a snotty letter to
IBM along
the lines of "nyah, nyah, we can use your processor architecture because
it isn't patented", and IBM pointed out that they do in fact have a
bunch of patents on it, which TurboHercules *might* be infringing.
And I think this is the key here. As soon as IBM replied it got covered
on a pile of open source websites as "IBM hates open source" which
seemed a bit fishy considering how much money they make from it...
5372
days inactive
5374
days old
15 comments
11 participants
participants (11)
-
arcarlini＠iee.org -
ard＠p850ug1.demon.co.uk -
bdwheele＠indiana.edu -
dm561＠torfree.net -
doc＠vaxen.net -
dseagrav＠lunar-tokyo.net -
eric＠brouhaha.com -
hilpert＠cs.ubc.ca -
julian＠twinax.org -
jws＠jwsss.com -
ploopster＠gmail.com