question about getting Multiplan working on Xenix

[Todd]

Hi,

I'm trying to get Multiplan working on Xenix. I've following the directions below (fantastic!), but when I go to write the modified file to a physical disk DC42 says that the image is corrupted and won't let me proceed. DC42 likes the unmodified file, so the file I'm starting with is fine.

https://lisalist2.com/lisalist1/2496.html

Any ideas?

Many Thanks,

Todd

[rayarachelian]

Likely it's just the checksum. You could try re-opening it and closing it with lisafsh-tool.
If that doesn't work, try booting BLU on your Lisa and using that to restore to physical media.

[Todd]

Many thanks. That's exactly the problem, DC42 reports checksum problem. I'll investigate lisafsh-tool (I only know it from trying to hack Multiplan) or, worst case, use BLU.

[rayarachelian]

Many thanks. That's exactly the problem, DC42 reports checksum problem. I'll investigate lisafsh-tool (I only know it from trying to hack Multiplan) or, worst case, use BLU.

you'd just run it like this, piping an echo to it would cause it to close the image when EOF is reached on stdin

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echo | lisafsh-tool multiplan.dc42


[Todd]

It worked! Thank you thank you! Multiplan lives!

I've made several "worksheets" and it's impressive.

The help system is excellent for getting up to speed. Interesting that "save" and "load" are subsets of "transfer" (i.e. save is "transfer save" and load is "transfer load").

Has anyone had any luck trying to print? (Being lazy - I haven't dived into any lp stuff).

Next up I'm going to attach a terminal to the serial port to try to run multiple Multiplan instances. One is not enough!

[Todd]

I'm sorry, does anyone know the communication setting for connecting a terminal to the Lisa's serial port for Xenix?

I tried serial A and got nothing. I'm getting garbage echo-ing from serial B so that's progress, but I played with various parameters to no joy. Settled on 9600-N-8-1, but mostly get "y" echo-ed back. Are there any nuances to this?

I use serial B with BLU so think hardware-wise the serial port is OK, will re-test that while I am at it.

Many thanks. Sorry to be a bother but hopefully this will be helpful for someone doing a search.

[rayarachelian]

I think you have to edit some system files to get getty running on serial port a and b, I don't remember how to do that off the top of my head, but this might help:  http://www.nj7p.org/Manuals/PDFs/Intel/174389-001.pdf page 111-112 (10-7 to 10-8) - looks like /etc/ttys is what you'd want to edit.

and http://bitsavers.org/pdf/apple/lisa/xenix/XENIX_Lisa_2_Reference_May84.pdf page 114, 134, 446
Looks like for the Lisa you'd want something like:

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12ttya
12ttyb


or perhaps:

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12tty01
12tty02


Check /dev/tty* to see what shows up, prefix it with a "12" and add to /etc/ttys, then run enable on that device.
(I don't recall if it's supposed to be /dev/ttya or /dev/tty01 for serial ports, etc.)

[Todd]

Many thanks, sir! I'll report back with an update if there is anything to report.

[Todd]

It worked. . Next time I'll think to check the manual.

ttya and ttyb are the A and B serial ports. Not sure what tty01 and tty02 are.

I did

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enable ttyb

and was able to get the login prompt immediately. Used vt100 emulation and was able to get mp to run on the Lisa and on my laptop simultaneously logged in as two different users. Pretty cool.

Thanks again for your help,

Todd

[rayarachelian]

It worked. . Next time I'll think to check the manual.

ttya and ttyb are the A and B serial ports. Not sure what tty01 and tty02 are.

Yeah, I just didn't remember the exact names on the Lisa running Xenix. Too many Unix like operating systems in my lifetime from solaris, aix, linux, *bsd, etc. to tell them apart, you tend to remember what they have in common.

I did

Code Select Expand

enable ttyb

and was able to get the login prompt immediately. Used vt100 emulation and was able to get mp to run on the Lisa and on my laptop simultaneously logged in as two different users. Pretty cool.

Thanks again for your help,

Todd

Excellent! As your next homework assignment, you'll have to obtain one of those Sapient Tecmar clone Quad Serial Port cards, and then add four more terminals to your setup so you can use your Lisa as an office server.

[Todd]

Excellent! As your next homework assignment, you'll have to obtain one of those Sapient Tecmar clone Quad Serial Port cards, and then add four more terminals to your setup so you can use your Lisa as an office server.

I accept the challenge!

(Attached an image of dueling mp instances)

[compu_85]

As your next homework assignment, you'll have to obtain one of those Sapient Tecmar clone Quad Serial Port cards, and then add four more terminals to your setup so you can use your Lisa as an office server.

I've been looking for one of these for just this purpose.....