Required: Dummies Guide for GoSDCio -> Mac

[richardtoohey]

Enjoy.

[Elminster]

I have my 3rd GoSDC in the post with a Plus1 Adapter card for the Electron.

Add that to Dave's ATI and ABR kits for the plus1 it should be fully tricked out.

All I need now is the Plus1

[Elminster]

I also got a copy of the Acorn Electron World Books collection DVD and it's absolutely brilliant!
There's a few book I remember either owning or borrowing from the library all those years ago.

Are these extra books on top of what is downloadable on the Interweb like those found on 8bs.com ?

[Adders]

I also got a copy of the Acorn Electron World Books collection DVD and it's absolutely brilliant!
There's a few book I remember either owning or borrowing from the library all those years ago.

Are these extra books on top of what is downloadable on the Interweb like those found on 8bs.com ?

I'm not sure. But there are around 133 books altogether. Absolutely amazing collection.

[richardtoohey]

The list of books is here:

http://www.acornelectron.co.uk/books/el ... p_lvl.html

Obviously to get the content they'd like you to buy the DVD.

[Elminster]

The list of books is here:

http://www.acornelectron.co.uk/books/el ... p_lvl.html

Obviously to get the content they'd like you to buy the DVD.

Thanks. I will have a look. Some books I am after don't seem to have a scan on the web

[Adders]

The DVD was worth every penny. I think it cost less than a tenner, with free postage and is actually 2 DVDs in one case.
I spent a few hours yesterday day just browsing through the collection.
Best 10 quid I've spent in a long time.

[richardtoohey]

Yes, and even if you can get a lot of the content online, if you are time-poor you can get the DVD and save yourself a lot of time.

I still like the paper versions, though, so slowly collecting the dead wood versions of ones that I want.

[Elminster]

I still like the paper versions, though, so slowly collecting the dead wood versions of ones that I want.

I have a few. Although the C was is locked up in a safe to stop people chopping it up

http://cloud.collectorz.com/211684/books

Although I have another 10 in the post.

[richardtoohey]

Although I have another 10 in the post.

Hey, leave some for the rest of us to buy!

[Elminster]

Although I have another 10 in the post.

Hey, leave some for the rest of us to buy!

Was you after anything in particular? Can keep my eyes open.

[richardtoohey]

Thanks for the offer, Duncan.

But I don't know what I need until I see someone else with one.

Nothing in particular at the moment, and got plenty to read.

[richardtoohey]

@Adders - did you know the GoSDC also has sideways RAM?

So you can load ROM images e.g. StarMon.

They don't survive reboot, but still good to have.

So I have an SSD with the PRES ABR tools on, and I can do:

Code: Select all

*SDCDISC STARMON
*LOADROM STARMON 3
*STARMON

[Adders]

@Adders - did you know the GoSDC also has sideways RAM?

So you can load ROM images e.g. StarMon.

They don't survive reboot, but still good to have.

So I have an SSD with the PRES ABR tools on, and I can do:

Code: Select all

*SDCDISC STARMON
*LOADROM STARMON 3
*STARMON

Hey Richard, no I didn't know that. So that's my Saturday afternoon taken care of
Thanks a lot. Now to find some rom images

[richardtoohey]

Now to find some rom images

Um, yes, whether there is that much useful on ROM for Electrons is another question. Especially when the performance of GoSDC means there's very little waiting for stuff to load, anyway!

I've attached the zip with the SSD with LOADROM and STARMON on it, so you can at least have a play with that.

If you find .rom image files, you'll need to get them onto an SSD (like I did with StarMon.)

But if you want to muck around with programming and SWRAM, GoSDC has got some.

In the documentation: Documentation/Use/use.html#SIDEWAYSROMRAM

offers 8 sideways RAM banks

[Adders]

I've attached the zip with the SSD with LOADROM and STARMON on it, so you can at least have a play with that.

Thanks a million Richard

[richardtoohey]

Just be careful that you don't overwrite the ROM you used for the filing system.

You would have done something like this:

Code: Select all

*SDCCONFIG FSRM 1

So the Filing System goes in ROM bank 1. So for StarMon I used

Code: Select all

*LOADROM STARMON 3

to use bank 3.

I think you can use

Code: Select all

*SDCCONFIG

by itself to see your settings, if you can't remember what you used for FSRM.

[Elminster]

Dave reminded me about the custom MOS for Electron for the GoSDC so you can load tapes (i.e. UEFs) from GoSDC. Got all that working fine.

Now although JK provides scripts to get STH BBC Disk Archive onto GoSDC I didnt see the same for Electron.

So I wget'ed all of the Electron Tapes from STH and knocke up the following quick and dirty scripts to put them on my Electron SDC card (1st 4GB is Electron, 2nd 4GB is the BBC Disk Archive from STH + misc).

Caveat the code may destroy you system, and take out half of the Universe.

Code: Select all

# !/bin/bash

FLASHDISK="/dev/disk2"
ARCHIVE_WGETDIR="$HOME/Acorn/BBC/gosdcsth/ELECTRON/"
ARCHIVE_DIR="www.stairwaytohell.com/electron/uefarchive"
FULL_PATH=${ARCHIVE_WGETDIR}$ARCHIVE_DIR
GOSDCIO="$HOME/Acorn/GoSDCio"

cd $FULL_PATH

read -s -p "> " PASSWORD

[ ! -d tmp] && mkdir tmp

for uef_file in $(find . -name "*.zip" )
do 
	thebasename=$(basename -s .zip $uef_file)
	gosdc_filename="$(dirname $uef_file | tr -s "/" "." | sed -e 's/^\.\(.*\)/\1/g').$thebasename"
	echo $gosdc_filename
	unzip -d tmp $uef_file
	cd tmp
	gunzip -S .uef ${thebasename}.uef
	cd $FULL_PATH
	echo $PASSWORD | sudo -S $GOSDCIO -d$FLASHDISK -c "ADD TAPE $gosdc_filename tmp/${thebasename}" 
	rm tmp/*.txt tmp/$thebasename
done

All works for me and I am now playing Acorn UEF from STH loaded via GoSDC.

[woolly_axolotl]

Hello all,

I am sorry to 'bump' this, but I am still having the problem below and it is way beyond me. I have had a good hunt around online to try and solve this 'free pointer' thing but can find nothing. I just thought I would have one more try here, if no then I will probably accept as truth my suspicion that I have somehow corrupted my SD card, reformat and start from scratch. Sounds like a faff though, especially as it works fine in my electron

Hello everyone,

I was just wondering if anyone else was having this problem, or if it is just me. I have been using GoSDC quite happily for some time now. The GoSDC is working well with my electron, however I have just tried adding some new .ssd files to it on my Macbook and am getting the following message:

I type:

sudo ./GoSDCio -d/dev/disk2 -c "" -l

I get:

GoSDCio 0.74 (9 February 2013), Copyright (c) Zeridajh 2004..2013

GoSDCio: fatal error: Flash card catalogue is inconsistent with free pointer

The same message comes up when I try to add a disc as well. TBH I have no idea what this means or what to do. I am using all the same commands as ever, the only thing I have done recently is to upgrade to Yosemite. I do hope it's nothing to do with that!

Any pointers would be very welcome. I can go so far in the Terminal and then I get a bit lost. Quite annoying, I was looking forward to playing Sphinx Adventure!

[Elminster]

I have used Yosemite with no issue since it came out.

I assume you have checked that the device really is at /dev/disk2 and hasnt moved since the upgrade or not being picked up for some reason?

[woolly_axolotl]

Hi,

Yes I checked that. I seem to need to check that from time to time as it appears my SD card is prone to unannounced relegation!

[Elminster]

They are the obvious things covered. Have you tried contacting John K?

[woolly_axolotl]

I haven't yet, perhaps I shall. I have been a bit hesitant as I suspect it is not so much to do with the GoSDC as with me and MacOS. He is always very helpful though.

[daveejhitchins]

I've given-up on my Mac for trying to read the GoSSD SSD card! I now use the Windows SSD card reader, GoMMC Explorer, software that was pointed to earlier, by Adders, in this thread - here. It has a few quirks but once you know them then everything runs OK.

Dave H

[woolly_axolotl]

Alas that did not work. In the end I formatted and started again which has worked. Now running as smoothly as you could want. Must have got corrupted somehow. I wonder if you don't have to be much more careful taking the card in and out of the machine than I would have thought. I can't think how else that can have happened. Will take to only removing it with the elk off I think. Thanks all for helping out.

[jgharston]

I was going to post saying I need a GoSDCio for Dimmies for Windows, as I can't seem to get my head around it having discovered my laptop has a SDC socket. I've extrapolated from the sudo discussion that I need to be logged on as Admin to access raw disks, but that still gives me 'cannot access flash drive' errors. I'm going to try the MMC explorer linked above to see if that gets me any further.

[woolly_axolotl]

Well, I am still having intermittent problems with the SD card corrupting, even now it is in a Beeb, so I have my suspicions about what the SD card reader on my mac is doing, but I am having another problem that I was wondering if someone might be able to help with.

I can back up the SD card with:

sudo ./GoSDCio -d/dev/disk2 -c "BACKUP desktop"

This gives me a folder on my desktop with the red 'stop' symbol in the bottom right corner which I cannot access. The file is also called 'desktop'. Presumably this contains the script and the files on the card but I cannot check. Whenever I try to restore it using the -f "BACKUP" variation of the script, I am unable to do so. Does anyone know what is required to restore the backup onto the card? I cannot decide whether I need to (somehow) change the permissions on this folder to retrieve the contents or what.

This is a steep and interesting learning process, but also rather frustrating!

[Elminster]

You should end up with a directory containing a loads of sequential numbered files and a file called script.

I have done it on numerous occasions and dont remember having an issue. I can get to my Acorns at the moment due to a large file of stuff for a refurbishment being in the way. But I am looking at my GoSDC backup dir.

You should be able to change the permissions of the folder so that you can read it, althgouh I dont remember having to do that.

[woolly_axolotl]

That has helped enormously, thank you. I have worked out how to change the permissions (thanks, Google) and am now into the folder. No idea why that became an issue all of a sudden but it is now resolved.