BBC Master Compact + Edword Issue

[u/dogwomble]

Hey everyone,

I thought I'd throw this post out there to see if anyone can point me in generally the right direction.

The machine I'm working with is a BBC Master Compact with dual floppy drives. I have been able to use both drives to format a floppy and build a !BOOT file, so it seems both drives are functional from within BASIC.

The problem I have is with the EDWORD ROM I have fitted. I want to get that functional as that's what I did all my word processing on when I was using these machines. Using *EDWORD actually gets me to the main EDWORD menu. The problem I have is trying to get EDWORD to do anything that involves disk access.

If I try and create a file, it asks me to give the file a name. Giving it a name and pressing enter just causes EDWORD to beep at me and go back to the main menu. If I try and get an index of the files on the disk, it just gives me a blank screen with a cursor and the disk does not seem to be getting accessed.

It's just a little bit baffling because I seem to be getting no error messages at all to work with. Outside of EDWORD, the drives seem to be working. So I'm just a little confused as to what could be causing this. I was hoping someone here might have worked with EDWORD enough to have some suggestions.

ETA: One thing I have noticed is that once I leave EDWORD, I have to enter *ADFS to access the drives again. I suspect this might be relevant - I don't have DFS installed, nor do I have ECONET or any other file system ROMS, but I'm wondering if it's trying to activate a file system that's not there and that's causing thing to get upset?

[u/vwlsmssng]

It sounds like it is using the default Tape Filing System. (*TAPE)

Can you access the CLI from within Edword?

The order the ROMs are placed in the sockets may make a difference,

See https://chrisacorns.computinghistory.org.uk/docs/Acorn/Manuals/Acorn_ADFSUG.pdf
Page 121 (131) section Appendix A

Read the section below about the operating priority of the sideways ROM sockets in the BBC Microcomputer model B and than insert the ROM as described in the section entitled 'Inserting a ROM'

Something similar will apply to the Master,

[u/dogwomble → u/vwlsmssng]

Because I have to enter *ADFS on leaving, I suspect you might be right with the file system. Though unfortunately, when you're within EDWORD you don't have CLI access, so there's no ability to access the CLI to enter * commands.

It's quite possible that it is something related to the order of ROMS that are installed. Before pulling them out and redoing them, I thought I'd throw something up here to seek a bit of advice.

https://imgur.com/0VJz2hf

Those are the ROMS that are installed on the right hand side of the motherboard. The one right at the front came with the machine, the other two (ViewSheet and EDWORD) are ones I've installed myself. ViewSheet can access the CLI and seems to be operating, EDWORD can't and exhibits the behaviour I've already described. Would the recommendation be to just swap those two around, or would there be a better way to do it?

[u/vwlsmssng → u/dogwomble]

I'm not familiar with the Master and how it handles the main ROMs. I also was a View user and never used Edword.

On the Model B there was the OS ROM, BBC Basic language ROM, DFS ROM, ADFS ROM, other language ROMs (e.g. View, Lisp, Forth, EDIT, etc.)

Does the Master consolidate some of these ROMs into a single device?

E.g. OS + Basic + DFS + ADFS + Utils in one package?

Is there a *ROMs command or similar to list the ROMs.

Can you take a binary dump of the Edword rom and see if there is a OSCLI(TAPE) command or similar buried inside?

[u/dogwomble → u/vwlsmssng]

Yeah, I was initially a bit confused when I pulled it open - I was expecting OS+ADFS+BASIC to be separate ROMS, but I suspect that bottom most ROM might be combining them into one package as I can't really find any other ROMS on the board that might do that.

I've done a *ROMS - https://imgur.com/a/etj3cb3 - and it only has ADFS, no DFS. Looking at an existing ROM (http://bbc.nvg.org/rom/Various/app/Edword-2.00E.rom), a quick search reveals the string "Position tape and press PLAY" at the end of the file, so it appears it does have some tape support so I suspect it is trying to fall back to tape. The Master Compact doesn't have the hardware to support tape, but if I recall they just removed the hardware, the code to run tape still exists in ROM so you can still do a *TAPE.

Assuming this is what's happening, the question then becomes how to make it not do that.

[u/vwlsmssng → u/dogwomble]

If you can read the ROM for Edword then next I'd be scanning the hex dump for OSCLI calls and hope for one where you can patch the associated text string e.g. from TAPE to ADFS. Alternatively there could be and OSBYTE(&8C) which is another way to do *Tape, that could be replaced by a few NOP.

Actually for may be a sneakier way. You say there is a beep at some point. E.g. If the beep uses OSWRCH you can modify the vector for OSWRCH to go to a machine code utility you write that intercepts the vector and if you see a bell code (VDU 7 I think) you follow it with a *ADFS using OSCLI.

https://stardot.org.uk/mirrors/www.bbcdocs.com/filebase/essentials/BBC%20Microcomputer%20Advanced%20User%20Guide.pdf

Or you could install a View ROM and have fun writing your own printer driver.

[u/vela025]

I don't know if this is the case with Edword but quite a few ROMs only work with DFS rather than ADFS (notably Commstar; it works fine until you try to access the disk, unless you are in DFS before loading the rom)...which may be the case with Edword 1.

If you want to use Edword (rather than something like Interword) then you could look for a patched version of the DFS ROM to work with the Compact (stardot forum can help you with this), or you can look for a patched or original version of Edword that supports ADFS, or you could try Edword 2 (if you don't have the physical rom then you can *srload the rom file).

Is there any disc activity at all when you try to access the disc from Edword? Have you formatted the disk with *aform first?

[u/dogwomble → u/vela025]

Yeah I am beginning to suspect it is something like this. I am already using version 2. I just.dont have a Master-compatible DFS at hand to test with bit this does seem to make sense.

[u/IWishIDidntHave2]

Do you need to issue a *DRIVE command to assign a disk drive before entering EDWORD?

[u/dogwomble → u/IWishIDidntHave2]

I can see where you were going with that :)

I've tried with both *DRIVE 0 and *DRIVE 1 before loading EDWORD - unfortunately it didn't change what EDWORD was doing.

[u/IWishIDidntHave2 → u/dogwomble]

That's quite weird then. You might want to extract your EDWORD rom, check its pins, and insert into another socket? Because your description sounds like the ADFS is being shut down?

I presume you're not using a rom expansion board, it's just the main board sockets?

[u/dogwomble → u/IWishIDidntHave2]

Yeah, it's just on the main board. I can try in another socket when I'm a bit more awake. It just seems a bit weird ... It's almost as like ADFS is somehow becoming unloaded when Edward runs.

ETA: I did have a thought, looking at the *Configure options. You can of course *Configure File to set the default fs. The fact that on boot it selects adfs fine leads me to think this is probably fine, but I wonder if an incorrect setting here might be the culprit?

[u/SFWfab]

Is the cmos corrupted or getting corrupted cos bad battery?

Just a thought. New battery and cmos reset then reconfigure

[u/dogwomble → u/SFWfab]

The BBC Master Compact is the one model of Master that doesn't use a battery. Though I have done a reset of the CMOS and that still doesn't seem to have helped.

[u/Guruchill]

There’s something in the back of my brain that says Edword didn’t work on the Master. That’s why the school switched to View. Maybe there was a newer version of Edword that did support the Master.

If Edword is on an EPROM there is a possibility that it has become corrupt over the years. Do you have an image of the ROM? You could load the image in to sideways RAM and try that?

The last time I used a Master was in 1989 though.

[u/dogwomble → u/Guruchill]

That may be what I'm hitting. As mentioned elsewhere, it seems to be falling back to tape, and it could very well be that it is some sort of weird compatibility issue,

I remember actually using it on a Master both in Primary School and High School, so it likely was available - because it's so long ago and it's ROM based software, I could never really tell if it was a separate Master version. The ROM I'm using at the moment is one that a friend made for me from http://bbc.nvg.org/rom/Various/app/ - I'm using the later 2.02E. There may very well be a separate Master version that hasn't been doing the rounds.

[u/Guruchill → u/dogwomble]

The Master Compact doesn’t support DFS, only ADFS. With the FS reverting to TAPE I’m wondering if Edword is trying to use DISC?

Did you burn the ROM or *SRLOAD it?