DG S/130 progress

[Jay West]

Shadoo wrote...
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Then I developed a tool to connect it to PC via serial, using the console
port; this tool is somehow similar to VTserver for PDP11 realm, but more
expandable.
Basically, you can do memory transfers between Nova and PC (both
directions), and execute almost *ANY* I/O instruction on the Nova, under the
strict direction of the PC.
On the PC, a tool developed in Python is used to bootstrap a special binary
program (using Program Load feature on Nova), and then to execute special
scripts, prepared for particular disk and/or tape peripherals, to dump a
device to image file (compatible with SIMH), dump an image file to device,
format a disk, and so on...
As all these procedures are controlled remotely by the PC, on the Nova
always sits the very same small binary code, thus supporting new peripherals
should be very easy, once one understands how the whole stuff works.

I already developed (and debugged using an emulated Nova3 on SIMH) all is
needed to read/write/format disks on 6030.
I think the very same code should work on the S/130, so if you want you
could give a try.

Interested?
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YES. Send me details off-list. Also, you wouldn't happen to have a bootable
diskette for the 6030 you could send me would you? I'd just like one that is
bootable (don't care what it boots) for testing purposes!

J