On 2015-11-13 00:27, Ian S. King wrote:
PIP10 will let you read (and ISTR, write) PDP-10 formatted tapes on a
PDP-8/TC08. Been there, done that. I don't know if there would be a
problem on a TD8E setup. -- Ian
No, PIP10 knows of both the TC08 and TD8E. If you ever read the PIP10
source code, you'll see the drivers for both controllers in the code.
(Yay for OS/8. Any program wanting to deal with a device in any way
beyond the very basic as to have its own drivers for the device. OS/8
device drivers are super primitive...)
However, that is still dealing with DECtapes. I'm curious about the
ability to deal with LINCtapes, that don't use the same codes on the
mark track (or whatever it was called, my memory fails me at the moment).
The TD8E do not understand things at all, and everything have to be done
in software, which is why I'm saying that it will actually deal with the
LINCtape format if you want it to.
However, more "intelligent" controllers do all this processing of the
mark track to identify start and end of block/tape, and all other
processing, in the controller. Can you make them read out the contents
and do the processing if you have different control codes?
Johnny
On Thu, Nov 12, 2015 at 1:42 PM, Paul Koning <paulkon...@comcast.net> wrote:
On Nov 12, 2015, at 4:29 PM, Johnny Billquist <b...@update.uu.se> wrote:
On 2015-11-12 19:49, Al Kossow wrote:
On 11/12/15 7:27 AM, Jon Elson wrote:
LINCtape is essentially identical to DECtape. I think the directory
format is different, but I think the block format is the same. I think
the tapes are wound in reverse order and the order of increasing block
numbers is reversed.
Actually the block format is different. "Obverse Compliment" encoding
was created for DECtape. LINCtape blocks aren't bidirectional.
Aha. Interesting. I didn't know that the bit patterns of the control
channel was different.
Curious question then - could most DECtape controllers even read
LINCtpae?
I know the TD8E can. The most stupid controller on the planet, but it
enables you to deal with just about any DECtape format you could possibly
ever invent.
But other DECtape controllers might not be able to deal with tapes that
use other codes to indicate what is being read...?
I believe you can do this on the TC11 with the READ-ALL operation, but my
memory is vague and the manuals I have handy aren't detailed enough.
paul
--
Johnny Billquist || "I'm on a bus
|| on a psychedelic trip
email: b...@softjar.se || Reading murder books
pdp is alive! || tryin' to stay hip" - B. Idol
