[A83] Re: extra storage

To: assembly-83@lists.ticalc.org
Subject: [A83] Re: extra storage
From: Gavin Olson <gtolson@comcast.net>
Date: Tue, 17 Dec 2002 17:17:06 -0500
In-reply-to: <13908.1040161384@www38.gmx.net>
References: <5.1.0.14.0.20021217162527.00a7fd20@mail.comcast.net>
Reply-To: assembly-83@lists.ticalc.org

At 10:43 PM 12/17/2002 +0100, you wrote:
> > A driver program would work for the storage of a bunch of little programs
> > on the device, as you don't have to waste sectors so badly.  For bigger
> > programs though, like eBooks (With external storage, you could put them on
> > an 83!) or big RPGs (Narkeman, etc.), the driver takes up[ precious
> > space.  Perhaps a two-mode controller on the storage device, so that it
> > can communicate in the high-speed, verbose mode of the driver or the basic
>TI
> > calc-to-calc protocol. If the special protocol were made close enought to
> > the TI protocol, then the TI one could be made a subset of the special
> > protocol.  Having the driver is mainly helpful with a bunch of little
> > stuff anyway, as that when you want to see a listing of program names and
>stuff.
> >
>
>As far as I understand, getting variables to the external storage is not the
>problem, getting them back to the calc is, right? How about a (small) driver
>that manually sends a command to the storage? The storage could then use
>the silent link protocol (tell the calc it's the graphlink) to place
>programs on
>the calc. This way, TI-OS would do most of the work, leaving extra ram for
>the user.

Using the Link menu puts all the work on TIOS.  If you do the memory 
management on the device right, you also don't suffer the large sector 
issues with the PSX memory card solution.  Selecting the program to return 
on the device just needs a button to cycle through all of the sectors (this 
brings back large sector issues) or a display that allows a browsing of the 
tree.  The driver allows you to browse the stuff on the calc, so the device 
is simpler.  My thought is thus:

Have the device send a small program to the calc that then pulls a bigger 
program from the device into non-program memory (like a SafeRam or 
something) and runsit there, so that memory is preserved.  This program 
would handle the browsing tasks all outside the memory that stuff gets 
transfered into, so the client takes up effectively no space (the small 
loader would delete itself after running the browser)

References:

[A83] Re: extra storage

From: Gavin Olson <gtolson@comcast.net>

[A83] Re: extra storage

From: robvanwijk@gmx.net