This will be my first tutorial on using

OS-9 and it will be for the beginners

who bought OS-9 and are now ripping

their hair out trying to figure out how

to use it now that they have it...

OS-9 is >NOT< a programming language.

It is totally different from BASIC and

if you wish to program in Basic than I

suggest you buy Basic09 after you are a

bit familiar with OS-9...

For people who have Disk Basic 1.0 you

will need to load the OS-9 BOOT disk

and RUN"*"...This will then tell you to

put the OS-9 Master Disk in Drive 0 and

push any key to continue...

If you have Disk Basic 1.1 then all you

need to do is put the OS-9 Master Disk

in Drive 0 and type DOS...

Now that OS-9 has started up and given

you your Logo and license info it will

ask you for the DATE and TIME.  This

info is >>VERY<< important and should

be given correctly each time you start

up OS-9...DO >NOT< JUST HIT ENTER, GIVE

A DATE AND TIME.  This info is added to

each file as it is saved to disk and

will be used by the OS-9 in the future

to keep track of current files.  The

same info is also available to you to

help you keep tabs on the dates and

times of the files that you saved to

disk...

OS-9 runs on a 24 hour clock so when

giving the time you must remember that

times after 12 noon convert to the

following:

1 pm-1300 hours

2 pm-1400 hours

3 pm-1500 hours

    .

    .

    .

10 pm-2200 hours

11 pm-2300 hours

midnite-0000 hours



To enter Dec 25, 1985...3:30 pm you

would type

           YY/MM/DD HH:MM:SS

           85/12/25 15:30:00



After a date and time have been given

to OS-9 you may check this time anytime

you want from OS-9 by tying DATE T at

OS9: prompt.  If you just say DATE that

is all you will get...You must say

DATE T to get the date and the time...

OS-9 has only a few commands already in

memory.  All the rest of the commands

that you can use from OS-9 are on your

Master Disk.  Each time you give a

command at the OS9: prompt the computer

will check to see if the command is in

memory and then it will go to the disk

in drive 0 and check the /D0/CMDS 

directory to see if the command is in

there.  You must remember to type the

command in correctly (SPELLING) or it

won't be found when the computer goes

to the /D0/CMDS directory looking for it

OS-9 can be a bit slow as it has to go

to the /D0/CMDS directory each time you

type a command at the OS-9 prompt but

you can speed this up a bit by loading

some of the commands that you will use

the most in OS-9. So you could type:

OS9:load dir list del attr copy

You will now have the commands dir,

list, del, attr, copy all in memory and

they are ready for quick access. The

drawback is that they are taking up

memory that you might need later. The

only way around this right now is to

either set your drives to run at a new

faster step rate (another tutorial) or

to get a Hard Disk Drive for use with

your OS-9.  Radio Shack had OS-9 coded

to run the disk drives at 30 MS. track

to track and to format the disk as 35

tracks.  Both of these can be changed

with a little knowledge of OS-9 or by

buying some commercial software that

will make the changes in OS-9 for you.

Another way to speed up OS-9 is to add

a 256K Ram Disk to your CoCo.  With the

256K Ram board installed and the right

software added to OS-9 the extra memory

will act like a >very< fast 40 track

disk drive.

.......................................

OS-9 always has 2 directories that it

keep track of...One is the DATA and the

other is the EXECUTION directory.  When

you type a command OS-9 will check the

current EXECUTION directory which is

/D0/CMDS at startup for the command you

just typed in.  When you go to do a

list, dir, del, rename, etc...OS-9 is

going to do to the current DATA

directory and look for your file there.

The current DATA directory at startup

is /D0...

So if you just type DIR OS-9 will go

and assume you meant DIR /D0...If you

wish to get a directory of say the

DEFS directory you must give OS-9 the

whole pathlist (NAME) to the directory.

In this case you would type:

DIR /D0/DEFS and OS-9 will know which

directory you are talking about.

So how do you know what is a command?

Or what is a data file? Or what is a

directory?  You can get this info by

typing:

DIR E /D0

and OS-9 will give you a directory

of everything that is in the /D0

directory with exact info on each entry

in that directory.  You will get the

date and time the entry was put on the

disk and the user number (0 which means

you), the entry's name, the attributes

of the entry and the size of the entry

in hexadecimal.

It is the attributes of an entry that

we will want to check. They list across

like this:

     DSPPPERW

       EWR

     --------

That is 8 slots that can have a letter

in it.  If the DIR E command shows this

on a line

     D--RW-RW

It would mean that it is a directory

and that you and any timesharing users

you had on your system could read and

write to that directory...

If the entry gives this back:

     --E--ERW

It would mean that it is a command that

can be used by you and your timesharing

users and that you have the right to

say copy that file, rename that file or

delete that file.  The timesharing user

would only be able to execute the file.

......................................

If you don't want to do a DIR E on a

whole disk than you can get the info

you need on a single entry by typing:

ATTR /D0/startup

this will printout the attributes in

the same manner as the DIR E command

did, but you now have the option of

changing the attributes of a file on

the disk...

We'll use the /D0/startup file for an

example...say the ATTR /D0/startup

prints this

    ------rw

This means that the file can be read

and written to.  But say you don't want

to accidently delete or rename the file

in the future?  You can type:

ATTR /D0/startup -w

and the write ability to that file will

be taken away.  If you tried to delete

that file now you would get an error

message.  You can use this ATTR command

to change the attributes on all your

important files so that they will not

be deleted by accident in the future.

This is kind of like having a write

protect tab on your disk like in Disk

Basic.  But you can protect single files

on the disk.  Or even lock out a DATA

directory from having files written or

deleted from it.

......................................

When I told you that OS-9 will check

to see if a command is in memory and

then check for it in the EXECUTION

directory I left out a final thing that

it does.  It will go to the DATA 

directory and check to see if there is

a DATA file there with the same name as

what you typed in at the OS-9 prompt.

You can check this out yourself. LIST

the file startup like this:

LIST /D0/startup

You will see this:

setime <term

it looks like a command right?  Well it

is what OS-9 calls a procedure file.

OS-9 will take the command you type in

and first check to see if it is in 

memroy, if that fails it will go to the

EXECUTION directory and see if the

command is there, if that fials it will

go to the DATA directory and see if

there is a procedure file there with

the name you typed in.  If there is it

will read one line at a time from that

file and treat it like you were typing

in the lines from the keyboard.  If

you want to try this...Just type startup

at any OS-9 prompt and the system will

ask you again for the DATE and TIME to

use on the system.

You can build a procedure file of your

own that does a little more than the

startup file does...DO THIS at the OS-9

prompt:

OS9:build /d0/myfile

you will then see a (?)

at each (?) type these lines

? dir /d0

? dir /d0/cmds

? mfree

? free

? (enter)

You will now have a data file on /D0

called myfile.  If you were to type

myfile at an OS-9 prompt you will then

see a DIR of /D0 and then a DIR of

/D0/CMDS and then you will get a mfree

(memory free), and finally you will get

a free (free disk space) all listed to

your screen one at a time.  OS-9 did

all the commands in the data file as if

you just typed them in at the keyboard.

Not bad huh???

......................................

Now the next important thing to worry

about with OS-9 is how does it keep

tabs on free space in memory and on the

disks???  Memroy in the computer is

split up in blocks of 256 bytes.  If 

you do a mfree you will get back about

159 to 162 blocks of memroy.  If you

know that 4 blocks of 256 bytes makes

one K (kilobyte) than you know you have

about 40K free in memory for your

programs and commands.  This same idea

is carried over to the disk drive.  All

writes to the disk are done in blocks

of 256 bytes or 1 sector.  A newly

formatted disk will have about 640

sectors on it.  But 10 of these sectors

are taken away for use as directory

pointers.  As OS-9 only writes out to 

the disk in blocks of 256 bytes you will

be able to get more info on an OS-9

disk than a Radio Shack Dos disk which

stores data to the disk in blocks of

9 sectors (9*256=2304 bytes).  Write 1

chr. to an OS-9 disk and you lose 1

sector.  Write 1 chr. to a RS Dos disk

and you lose 9 sectors!!!

......................................

Now do a DIR /D0/CMDS and you will see

quite a long list of commands that are

available to you.  Don't worry about all

those titles because as you learn OS-9

you will become familiar with all of

them and probably not use all of them.

The nice thing about OS-9 that was so

different from RS Disk Basic was that

it is so easy to add >MORE< commands to

OS-9 than it was to add commands to the

RS DOS.  If you know 6809 machine

language you might even write some

commands that you will find useful and

might want to sell or trade with other

OS-9 users.  If you aren't all that

familiar with machine language then you

can buy some new commands fo OS-9 from

companies like Frank Hogg or from

Computerware or D.P. Johnson.  These

are commands that are so easy to

install on your OS-9 disk!!!  All you

need to do is copy them to your

EXECUTION directory which is usually

the /D0/CMDS directory.  They are then

available for your use.  No worry on

your part as to will they work with

your OS-9!!!  Some of these programs

are actual commands that you call from

OS-9 and other programs are what are

called FILTERS that you pipe data thru

under OS-9 (more on this in future

tutorial)...

.......................................

And now one final thing to cover on

OS-9 before I end this lesson.  Is

there a difference btw. upper and lower

case when you type in commands???  The

answer is no...no...no...

If you type in DIR /D0 or dir /d0 they

will both act correctly...if you type

LIST /D0/STARTUP or list /d0/startup

they will both work correctly.  OS-9

doesn't care about the case of the

commands you type in.  But here is a

standard that you might wish to keep to

so that what is on your disk are a bit

easier to understand.  It is felt that

if you keep all directory names in

capital letters and all data/comand

files in lower case you will have a

better idea of what is on your disk

when ;you use the dir command.  I find

this a useful tip and try to follow it

strictly when I work with OS-9.

....................................

The next lesson in the tutorial series

will be on nested directories and on

pipe and filters and how they are most

useful under OS-9.

Bob Montowski  215-277-6951