Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.


Author Topic: Games and other software for IS-DOS (Read 33997 times)

Offline gflorez

  • EP addict
  • *
  • Posts: 3614
  • Country: es
    • Támogató Támogató
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #15 on: 2021.February.13. 11:05:56 »
I always thought that using the pound symbol was a nice characteristic of the computer. As nice as the channel concept, that I discovered by first time on the EP.

Offline BruceTanner

  • EP lover
  • *
  • Posts: 608
  • Country: gb
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #16 on: 2021.February.13. 11:15:39 »
:lol: The difference between someone who uses £ as their currency and someone who doesn't! :lol:

Offline elmer

  • EP fan
  • *
  • Posts: 196
  • Country: us
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #17 on: 2021.February.13. 17:59:06 »
Or maybe # is more useful than £ in IS-DOS, especially considering most use is in Hungary, so just change £ to # permanently in new IS-DOS? :shock:

Both the Hungarian and German language ROMs for the Enterprise already change the "£" to a "#", and the world, even in the 1980s, confirmed the decision that ASCII code 23h was a "#" and not a "£".

The American-designed Apple II, Atari 800, Atari ST, Commodore PET, Commodore 64, Commodore Amiga, MSX, and the British-designed Amstrad CPC, Amstrad PCW, Camputers Lynx, Memotech MTX512, Oric, Oric Atmos, Sam Coupe, Sinclair Spectrum, Sinclair QL, Tatung Einstein, Acorn Archimedes, and even the Acorn BBC Micro, yes even the BBC, the bastion of British culture, all agreed that ASCII code 23h was a "#" and not a "£".

Although IBM computers had special British keyboards available with a "£" instead of a "#", they put the "£" at a different code point (A3h).

This battle was lost a long time ago, and the Enterprise was on the losing side of the fight. ;-)

That is why I swapped the positions of the "#" and the "£" when I recently released my font changes for the EXOS 2.4 ROM and all of the international Language ROMs.

I really don't want IS-DOS to change the current font, because that conflicts with the user's choice of their own font.  The widely-used Hungarian HFONT extension, together with my modified Language ROMs, modified HFONT and modified EFONT, all move the current font basline down by a pixel so that accented characters (and all inverse characters) look better on the screen.
« Last Edit: 2021.February.13. 18:34:21 by elmer »

Offline elmer

  • EP fan
  • *
  • Posts: 196
  • Country: us
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #18 on: 2021.February.13. 18:12:34 »
I have always thought OPEN £1 looked silly, it should be OPEN #1:!

And you very sensibly confirmed that belief by having your FORTH ROM change the "£" to a "#" as soon as it starts up! :lol: :ds_icon_cheesygrin:

Offline szipucsu

  • Global Moderator
  • EP addict
  • *
  • Posts: 10082
  • Country: hu
    • Támogató Támogató
    • Webnyelv.hu - Tanuljunk nyelveket!
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #19 on: 2021.February.13. 18:32:10 »
I really don't want IS-DOS to change the current font
Anyway, it is funny for us Hungarian because the word "font" means "pounds" in Hungarian. The British currency. You can imagine when we heard the word "font" for a character set for the first time, we found it funny because we thought of the currency. Someone who is not good at informatics is confused when we speak of a "font". :D (Everybody knows here what the British currency is but not everybody knows about character sets.)
100 SOUND SOURCE 2,STYLE 128,PITCH 25.2,SYNC 1
110 SOUND PITCH 25,SYNC 1
120 ! Videos

Offline elmer

  • EP fan
  • *
  • Posts: 196
  • Country: us
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #20 on: 2021.February.13. 19:04:21 »
Anyway, it is funny for us Hungarian because the word "font" means "pounds" in Hungarian. The British currency. You can imagine when we heard the word "font" for a character set for the first time, we found it funny because we thought of the currency. Someone who is not good at informatics is confused when we speak of a "font". :D (Everybody knows here what the British currency is but not everybody knows about character sets.)

Hahaha, thank you for the information, I never knew that.  How confusing for people! :shock: :lol:

I am ancient enough that my school actually had an old letterpress machine, so I got to experience using real metal typefaces (fonts/founts) before ever using a computer! :cool:

That is partially why I care so much about the readability of text on the computer screen, and why I felt it important enough to spend the time to "fix" some of the less desirable aspects of the Enterprise's EXOS font, while still trying to keep its unique style.

Offline elmer

  • EP fan
  • *
  • Posts: 196
  • Country: us
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #21 on: 2021.February.13. 19:25:40 »
I don't remember where I downloaded these files from:

Probably here!

The problem with those games on IS-DOS is because of two things ...

1) They use some Heath H19 escape sequences that not supported by either IS-DOS 1.0 or my recent IS-DOS 1.1-alpha.
2) They send a truncated (i.e. wrong) escape sequence that confuses IS-DOS.

I will change the "fast" video driver in IS-DOS to support all of the escape sequences that the games need, and also upload a fixed version of the .COM file.

The company that originally released the games on CP/M also provided this file to customize them for different terminals ...

Code: [Select]
;Copyright 1982 Infocom, Inc.  All rights reserved.

;Configuration Program for INTERLOGIC(tm) CP/M Files

;Configured for VT100 compatible terminal (25 lines)

;This program should be edited to specify terminal and
;printer parameters for your CP/M system.  Edit this
;file, then assemble, load, and run the program.
;Complete documentation of the setup procedure will
;be found in your INTERLOGIC Reference Card.

;Terminal and printer specific parameters start at
;the label CPMCPL, about 20 lines below.  Nothing
;prior to that label should be altered.

ORG 100H

LPDL EQU 100H
BDOS EQU 05H
FCB EQU 05CH

PSTRNG EQU 9
OPEN EQU 15
CLOSE EQU 16
WRITES EQU 21
SETDMA EQU 26

START: JMP FNAMEP ;Jump to filename patch

;Setup parameters begin here.  Refer to the INTERLOGIC
;Reference Card for CP/M for complete documentation for
;editing this file.

CPMCPL: DB 80 ;Characters/line (132 maximum)
CPMLPP: DB 24 ;Lines/screen (NOT including status line)
CPMFN: DB 'ZORK1',20H,20H,20H
;File name (DO NOT CHANGE THIS)
CPMCLF: DB 1 ;1 if LF should print after CR on screen
CPMLLF: DB 1 ;1 if LF should print after CR on printer
CPMINV: DB 0 ;Number to add to ASCII value of characters
;to have them print in inverse video.
;This is not applicable on many terminals.

;The following strings have a count field followed by up
;to 32 characters.

TINIT: DB 11, 1BH,'[2J',1BH,'[25;1H'
;Initialize the terminal. 
;Should position the cursor at the
;lower left corner of the screen.
;On terminals with the facility, a
;scrolling region should be established
;to include all but the top line on
;the screen.  Also, clearing the screen
;is desirable.

DS 32-$+TINIT+1
TRESET: DB 0 ;Reset the terminal at end of game.
;For example, if a scrolling region
;was established, reset it to include the
;entire screen.  Clearing the screen is
;NOT desirable.

DS 32-$+TRESET+1
BLINE:  DB 7, 1BH,'[H',1BH,'[7m'
;Begin status line.
;Should move the cursor to the upper
;left corner of the screen.  If at all
;possible, should go into inverse video.

DS 32-$+BLINE+1
ELINE:  DB 11, 1BH,'[0m',1BH,'[25;1H'
;End status line.
;Should move the cursor to the lower
;left corner of the screen.  If status
;line uses inverse video, this state
;should be cleared.

DS 32-$+ELINE+1
PINIT:  DB 0 ;Printer initialization.
;If any setup is required prior to
;using scripting.

FNAMEP: ; filename patch
LXI H,FCB+1
MOV A,M
CPI '0' ;lowest valid char
JC CPMSTR ;use default name
LXI D,CPMFN
MVI C,8
FNP1: STAX D
INX H
INX D
MOV A,M
DCR C
JNZ FNP1
JMP CPMSTR

DS 200H-$

;The setup parameters end at this point.  Nothing below this point
;should be changed for any reason.

CPMSTR: LXI SP,PDL+LPDL
LDA CPMCPL
CPI 132
JC CPMST1
MVI A,132
STA CPMCPL
CPMST1: LXI H,FCB
MVI B,36
L1: MVI M,0
INX H
DCR B
JNZ L1
LXI H,FCB+1
LXI D,CPMFN
MVI B,8
L2: LDAX D
MOV M,A
INX H
INX D
DCR B
JNZ L2
LXI D,EXT
MVI B,3
L3: LDAX D
MOV M,A
INX H
INX D
DCR B
JNZ L3

MVI C,OPEN
LXI D,FCB
CALL BDOS
INR A
LXI D,BADOPN
JZ FINIS

LXI D,100H
CALL WRITEB
LXI D,180H
CALL WRITEB

MVI C,CLOSE
LXI D,FCB
CALL BDOS
INR A
LXI D,BADCLS
JZ FINIS
LXI D,OK
FINIS: MVI C,PSTRNG
CALL BDOS
JMP 0

WRITEB: MVI C,SETDMA
CALL BDOS
MVI C,WRITES
LXI D,FCB
CALL BDOS
ORA A
RZ
MVI C,CLOSE
LXI D,FCB
CALL BDOS
LXI D,BADWRT
JMP FINIS

BADOPN: DB 0DH,0AH,'CAN NOT OPEN FILE$'

BADCLS: DB 0DH,0AH,'ERROR ON FILE CLOSE$'

BADWRT: DB 0DH,0AH,'WRITE ERROR$'

OK: DB 0DH,0AH,'CONFIGURATION PROGRAM FINISHED',0DH,0AH,'$'

EXT: DB 'COM'
PDL: DS LPDL


END START

Offline SlashNet

  • EP addict
  • *
  • Posts: 1330
  • Country: ua
  • Enterprise 128K | Cubietruck
    • My old site about Enterprise
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #22 on: 2021.February.13. 20:38:38 »
Probably here!

Yes. Looks very familiar, even though it was about 6 years ago.

Offline Lacika

  • EP addict
  • *
  • Posts: 3211
  • Country: hu
    • http://www.ep128.hu
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #23 on: 2021.February.13. 20:53:26 »
Probably here!

The problem with those games on IS-DOS is because of two things ...

1) They use some Heath H19 escape sequences that not supported by either IS-DOS 1.0 or my recent IS-DOS 1.1-alpha.
2) They send a truncated (i.e. wrong) escape sequence that confuses IS-DOS.

What is the difference between the above and the version here?
Looks like it works.

Offline elmer

  • EP fan
  • *
  • Posts: 196
  • Country: us
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #24 on: 2021.February.13. 21:53:16 »
What is the difference between the above and the version here?
Looks like it works.

The good things about the version on EP128.HU ...

1) It includes a file of hints.


The bad things about the version on EP128.HU ...

1) It does not use any of the terminal customization capabilities of the game, and so has no STATUS line or inverse video (2nd palette).
2) It has been limited to 64 columns instead of 80 columns. Why?
« Last Edit: 2021.February.13. 22:07:35 by elmer »

Offline gflorez

  • EP addict
  • *
  • Posts: 3614
  • Country: es
    • Támogató Támogató
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #25 on: 2021.February.13. 22:33:09 »
64 columns give us a clue of the original computer to which these versions were tailored.

I have searched and I have found the TRS-80 and the Exidy Sorcerer.

But I also found this assertion:"The original video displays for S-100 machines were normally 64x24 or 25. Practically every machine used this mode. 80-columns did not appear until well after CP/M was widely used."

Of course, on that web page there is somebody denying it.

Offline elmer

  • EP fan
  • *
  • Posts: 196
  • Country: us
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #26 on: 2021.February.14. 05:53:48 »
Here you go, here is the INFOCOM CP/M game program properly configured for IS-DOS (version 1.0 or later). :ds_icon_cheesygrin:

Note that there is only one program for all INFOCOM games, and the specific data for the game is entirely contained in the game's .DAT file.

Code: [Select]
===========================================================
INFOCOM Z-CODE INTERPRETER FOR CP/M (Enterprise IS-DOS 1.0)
===========================================================

This is the INFOCOM game program, configured for Enterprise
IS-DOS 1.0 or later.

It is believed to play Z-Code version 5 or earlier games.

See https://wiki.herzbube.ch/index.php/Z-Machine for a list
of INFOCOM games and their Z-Code version numbers.


To play the game PLANETFA.DAT, enter the command ...

 > INFOCOM.COM PLANETFA

If you want to customize the program to embed the game name
into the program ...

 > COPY INFOCOM.COM PLANETFA.COM
 > CONFIG.COM PLANETFA
 > PLANETFA.COM
« Last Edit: 2021.February.14. 06:01:01 by elmer »

Offline Lacika

  • EP addict
  • *
  • Posts: 3211
  • Country: hu
    • http://www.ep128.hu
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #27 on: 2021.February.14. 12:34:06 »
Thanks! Infocom games updated.

Offline elmer

  • EP fan
  • *
  • Posts: 196
  • Country: us
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #28 on: 2021.February.20. 22:57:31 »
Thanks! Infocom games updated.

It looks like I was wrong earlier, and the CP/M version of INFOCOM.COM will only play version 3 games, and not version 4-6 games.

Luckily, most of Infocom's games were version 3 files! :cool:


It also looks like one or two of the Infocom games on EP128.hu didn't get updated, which is no surprise because there were so many of them! :shock:

From what I can see, the data file for Enchanter is too short, and it must have been cut off. There may be others like that.

Here is an archive with INFOCOM.COM and all of the game files that it will play.  The game files come from a recent collection of all of the Infocom games, and they have accurate file lengths for the last released versions of the games.
« Last Edit: 2021.February.20. 23:04:37 by elmer »

Offline Lacika

  • EP addict
  • *
  • Posts: 3211
  • Country: hu
    • http://www.ep128.hu
Re: Games for IS-DOS
« Reply #29 on: 2021.February.21. 09:36:41 »
Thanks!
These .dat files have been included in the downloadable games.
Almost all the old ones were longer. It was rubbish at the end of the files.