SymbOS 2.1 First Beta released

Amazing!

Works in Padial SD reader?

What does this mean? Does it mean it doesn't work with the MegaFlashRomSCC+SD and a real MSX??
Or does it mean, the new MegaSD card driver works with the MegaFlashRomSCC+SD and OCM finally also?

@ray2day it means the latter.

I never succeeded in succesfully installing SymbOS and tonight, it failed again. I want to install Symbos in a directory named 'Symbos'. Is this even possible? Or does symbos only work when you install it in ROOT dir?

Anyway, after I copied all the files and dirs in A:/SYMBOS/ I booted SYMSETUP. I have MEGASD SCC+ in slot 23 and selected that device. Then the BOOT LOCATION. As driver I of course selected the MEGASD. But then it asks DRIVE LETTER. In MSX-DOS the MEGASD is DRIVE A. But in the symbos manual I somewhere read that in SYMBOS diskettestations are first mounted to A and B? And mass storage devices to C, D and so on? Anyway, I selected drive A anyway. Then I have to choose the CHANNEL? I have NO IDEA what that means. Then the partitions... I think my SD cards are not partitioned? Although when booting the MEGASD with CURSOR UP and have a look at the SD CARD INFO, I do see partition 1, 2, 3 and 4. Only 1 has data though, 2, 3 and 4 seem empty. Does this means my SD cards are not partitioned? Anyway, I choosed 0, not partitioned. Then I have to answer whether or not it is removable? I choosed NO.

Then it generates a CFG-file? But where is the SYMBOS.INI-file? It is not in the preview package. Do I have to copy it from the complete MSX package version 2.0?

All these questions. Anyway, I booted SYMBOS.COM and it actually starts

But when I want to do anything, there's a message on screen: 'File not found: The file or the path don't exist. Please check your input.'

I have no idea where to check my input.

And as I said, again, I failed installing Symbos.

It's too difficult for me....

- On your MegaFlash your A partition is probably partition 1. So choose Partition 1 as your partition in SYMSETUP.COM not 0
- Choose C as your drive and select the MegaSD as driver. (For the CARD slot choose the slot of your SD.. probably 0
- Choose Not removable
- Then save your settings.

If you not sure about your previos settings delete the CFG file and start blanco.

Then start Symbos!

Before you can do anything in SymbOS your have to set your systempath !! and save it !! ( then the symbos.ini file will be created) The systempath is in your case c:\symbos\ (if you setup your drive as C drive in SYMSETUP)

Save your settings!!

See my post!

Save Settings

Oh yes you can choose every directory you want .. if you set it in SymbOS
And I think you mean A:\SYMBOS\ (not A:/SYMBOS/)

With SYMSETUP.COM you just MAP your partition to a driver letter in SymbOS. (So C: is a good choice)

C:\symbos\ if this is the path where all the .exe files are located.

I had an MP3 card which is now in repair. Somewhere. Somehow.

I got it to work! Thanks a lot, edoz. And of course, thx Prodatron for this amazing piece of software

Please take this advice, make the install process absolutely dummy proof. It will give Symbos a huge boost in number of users.

The installation is already improved in this beta release. But indeed there is still improvements needed maybe on the other hand you now know how it works .. maybe plug and play ...for hardware and automatically system path detection etc.

Yes. I think because it was released at that time.
bdw. If you search for my files it can be find here.

other symbos programs

maybe we have to create a app store for symbos. ;-)

Looks excellent!
Cant wait to try it out

Is a mouse mandatory with symbos?
And what about gfx9000?

As soon as it has a "dummy proof" install with a total as possible auto detection of all possible hardware (and I have a mouse) I'd like to try Symbos...
I'm very curious since the first release but haven't tried it yet... Mostly since it has/had quite a hard install procedure (so I was told)...

@Meits: As NYYRIKKI told, it is also possible to use a joystick or GRAPH+ARROW KEYS/SPACE as a mouse replacement.
I am now working on this "dummy proof" installer

I can't agree with this. The following issues I encountered are not solved by reading those 20 lines. And the issues are not always 'being a dummy' related. It's just a matter of making a well thought out manual before releasing something big as an MSX OS.

That said, with SYMSETUP.COM the install procedure has already been hugely improved and after edoz helped me out pointing to the APPCP.EXE file, edoz told me the SYMBOS.INI file is being created when you first save your settings and Prodatron answered me SYMBOS.INI is the only file that needs to be in ROOT dir, everything worked out just fine. Meits, I'm sure you are able to install SYMBOS when you give it a try

Prodatron:

This is absolutely crazy!!

Almost ....?

SymbOS V.S.O.P.

Has to do something with old cognac
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_Special_Old_Pale
Oh yes, terrible, how time passes ;)

.... although being 6.5 years old, it could even be considered XO. The judges are still out on that one.

About browsing in websites with Symbos, I think maybe the link below can bring some ideas. If I understood correctly, all you need is a web browser that can understand basic html and a few tags to access even the most modern websites, through the use of a rendering proxy. This idea was already used in MSX with Fudebrowser, that allowed web browsing even on a MSX1. No need for JavaScript and other stuff in Symzilla. Wouldn't it be possible to surf the web in Symbos using a rendering proxy (even if the new browser was only available if the user is using GFX9000)?

http://virtuallyfun.superglobalmegacorp.com/?p=3866

@iamweasel2: Looks good! The only question is, if all the content including text is converted into images with a link-map? Didn't try it yet. If this is all based on images it will be probably not a good solution for the MSX I am afraid?

Or something like this link

Indeed, the major problem is how to achieve a good image converted to run in MSX2/2+. In GFX9000 I believe you can achieve a good outcome with this protocol. Of course the script could be tweaked to not convert text to image (or use a different algorithm when converting text to image to maximize its readability) and give the best result considering the MSX VDP limitations. Another solution would be to change to script to generate not an image but a new binary format more suitable to MSX (like Fudebrowser protocol does) ? So maybe it would be worth to try this image protocol and see how it works.

i assume this converter is running in windows ? Or do you the converted in symzilla ?

Amazing ! I assume that this is without pictures.
maybe it is a good idea to make a converter for the PC incl. Pictures. Then you can send the html request to this services which sending the doc format to the msx. But then you have indeed independence from a windows PC.

Would it be an option to create some sort of VNC client in Symbos to control a PC (or anything else for that matter) and have the host convert the display in a format that can be refreshed quickly on the MSX? In that fashion you are less limited by the content of the rich format you want to access and display. just a thought

Perhaps some of the great work from Konamiman could be adapted for the Symbos network drivers ? I think another challenge at the moment is finding network cards for MSX. As far as I know there isnt any commercially available at the moment.

I dont think the resolution is such a big issue. You would not need to display the entire host screen, only an area that corresponds to the size of your window around the cursor on the host.

a way to creat a own theme is a nice extra so you can let it look like a msx os and not windows

Major release is 3.0 right? Do you have a spec for driver writing (doesn't seem to be in the Symstudio docs) as I don't think DenYoNet would take a lot of work to do so would like to have a go at it... I am taking a few months off for meditation this winter, which, in my case, finally, means writing MSX software, so I want to prepare for some things before I begin (1 nov). One of my goals is to dive into Symbos dev to make it more usable. But networking is so crucial that I would suggest doing that the next minor release (2.2), not major. My humble suggestion that is.

Hi slowerisbetter! Trebmint will do a new version.. called Unify. That will be the replacement of Symstudio. At this moment symstudio is bit obsoleted However, I have received a custom version of symstudio. That one is more a less better that the .95 version. But there are still things broken in this version that works well in the .95 version or visa versa.. If you want to have this version drop me a mail.. I can send it to you. I think Trebmint don't care if I do

But I doubt that you can develop drivers with it.. you can mix assembly and symbasic in the editor.