Old trackball won't work on modern laptops

[Eeyore]

If you are running a dos program, use linux, and dosemu, which comes with
linux. I use it to run all of the old OrCAD tools from linux. dosemu can
use MSDOG, or it can use FreeDOS. I use FreeDOS, as it is open source, and
works better than the real thing.

What do you do about display drivers for DOS OrCAD ?

Graham

 

[Tom Lucas]

If you are running a dos program, use linux, and dosemu, which comes
with
linux. I use it to run all of the old OrCAD tools from linux. dosemu
can
use MSDOG, or it can use FreeDOS. I use FreeDOS, as it is open
source, and
works better than the real thing.

I guess that could work but would an emulated DOS offer all the features
that my equipment might require of the OS? I suppose I might just have
to suck it and see.

 

[Jim Thompson]

On Sunday, in article
<[email protected]>
[email protected]

On Sunday, in article
<[email protected]>
[email protected]
"Jim Thompson" wrote: [snip]

Of course this episode has already cost Joerg $1K in wasted time spent
scratching his ... ;-)

Yes but they can be such fun these challenges.

Like the simple one I did for SWMBO, who had a solar powered water feature
and 12V AC garden lights. Adding small box with relay enabled me to create
a pseudo solar panel from the 12V AC feed so water feature worked when
the garden lights were on.

SWMBO ;-) I sure do miss "RUMPOLE OF THE BAILEY". It hasn't been on
the tube here in quite a while :-(

The secret of happy life, remember to say things at the right time like
"yes dear", always with the correct amount of 'sincerity'.....

Then I know my place in the pecking order, I am not hen pecked as I have
been told to say.

Yep ;-)

Our 47th Wedding Anniversary is March 31.

...Jim Thompson

 

[Jim Thompson]

Paul Carpenter skrev: [snip]

USB is not always as deterministic as most people think it is.

We are talking about two different things, you are talking about a usb
to serial converter and
yes they change timing.

I was talking about trancievers e.g. max232, wired back to back and
_powered_ from USB 5volt
to go from rs232 to TTL and back to rs232 levels with a more powerful
tranciever

-Lasse

My thoughts also. Except the track-ball will need its 12V supply.

...Jim Thompson

 

[Chuck Harris]

What do you do about display drivers for DOS OrCAD ?

I use the "traceback" 1024x768 VESA driver. It is available in the files
section of the Yahoo Groups group "OldDosOrcad" Put TB1024.drv in the same
directory as the other drivers. It will not show up in the list of available
drivers (that list is hardwired in ERC), but if you enter it manually it will
be used.

The only trick you need to know to run Orcad with dosemu is that you must
run it in the "capture cursor" mode. That is done by pressing Ctrl-Alt-ScrollLock
from the dosemu window. The same sequence releases the cursor.

-Chuck

 

[Chuck Harris]

I guess that could work but would an emulated DOS offer all the features
that my equipment might require of the OS? I suppose I might just have
to suck it and see.

I cannot answer that. But what I can tell you is it works with a lot
of the old DOS shoot-em-up games.

lpt gets redirected to the lp printer spool, the com ports can be accessed
directly if you give dosemu permission. You set up your hard drive as
a sub directory somewhere, and the a: drive maps to the floppy.

I wouldn't expect it to work with dongles, or other devices that require
direct driving of the parallel port.

Try it, it might do what you need.

-Chuck

 

[Joerg]

On Sunday, in article
<[email protected]>
[email protected]

On Sunday, in article
<[email protected]>
[email protected]
:

[snip]

Of course this episode has already cost Joerg $1K in wasted time spent
scratching his ... ;-)

Yes but they can be such fun these challenges.

Like the simple one I did for SWMBO, who had a solar powered water feature
and 12V AC garden lights. Adding small box with relay enabled me to create
a pseudo solar panel from the 12V AC feed so water feature worked when
the garden lights were on.

SWMBO ;-) I sure do miss "RUMPOLE OF THE BAILEY". It hasn't been on
the tube here in quite a while :-(

The secret of happy life, remember to say things at the right time like
"yes dear", always with the correct amount of 'sincerity'.....

Then I know my place in the pecking order, I am not hen pecked as I have
been told to say.

Yep ;-)

Our 47th Wedding Anniversary is March 31.

My late father-in-law said on their 43rd: "How many more to go?"

He said that exactly once (didn't go over too well...).

 

[Joerg]

Paul Carpenter skrev:
[snip]

USB is not always as deterministic as most people think it is.

We are talking about two different things, you are talking about a usb
to serial converter and
yes they change timing.

I was talking about trancievers e.g. max232, wired back to back and
_powered_ from USB 5volt
to go from rs232 to TTL and back to rs232 levels with a more powerful
tranciever

-Lasse

My thoughts also. Except the track-ball will need its 12V supply.

So, let's see. I could whip up a beefy 13.56MHz generator, put a loop
under the table where the trackball usually is and then...

 

[Joerg]

I guess that could work but would an emulated DOS offer all the features
that my equipment might require of the OS? I suppose I might just have
to suck it and see.

Some of my filter design software doesn't come any other way than DOS.
Never had any problems running it all w/o a clean DOS boot. The only
catches are the occasional "speed overruns", IOW the program relied on
some DOS timers or whatever to flag a status but now it blazes by so
fast that I can't see what the flags read. And the calc speed of those
old programs on new PCs is phenomenal compared to the early 90's.

 

[Paul Carpenter]

On Monday, in article
<[email protected]>
[email protected]

Paul Carpenter skrev: [snip]
.....
I was talking about trancievers e.g. max232, wired back to back and
_powered_ from USB 5volt
to go from rs232 to TTL and back to rs232 levels with a more powerful
tranciever

-Lasse

My thoughts also. Except the track-ball will need its 12V supply.

Possibly also a -12V supply as well. Most serial mice were before common
usage of transceiver chips with their own power inverters.

 

[JeffM]

Some of my filter design software doesn't come any other way than DOS.
Never had any problems running it all w/o a clean DOS boot.
The only catches are the occasional "speed overruns",
IOW the program relied on some DOS timers or whatever to flag a status
but now it blazes by so fast that I can't see what the flags read.

Where are those Turbo buttons when you need them?

 

[Jamie]

I don't think even Linux software will add an ISA slot to your motherboard.

actually, they have PCI card converters for old ISA cards.

 

[Uwe Bonnes]

In a bit of a thread hijack, how good is Wine with odd legacy hardware?
I've got an ancient Noral 80188 emulator that needs a proprietory ISA
card in the PC and will only run under DOS. Would Wine let me use it on
a new PC or do you reckon that it would a be a bit too proprietory for
that?

Wine is not for emulating hardware. If your Dos program uses Raw IO accesses
and no interrupt, there are some chances. Run wine as root and allow wine
to access the IO ports in question

 

[jasen]

Eeyore wrote:

Only if you find a PS/2 plug. Now I can easily find tractor glow plugs
here in town, and horse feed, and hydraulic fluid, and... IOW this ain't
the big city.

no dead keyboards or mice lying around?

Bye.
Jasen

 

[jasen]

On a laptop the available USB current is limited, but still might be
around 100mA.

Don't know what's legal from PS/2.

Why not just a battery pack? Joerg is making the problem too
complicated.

a couple of 9V batteries... may only need one.

What's the output impedance of an MC1488 anyway?

I'm not a "gamer", but what _is_ a game port? How does it behave?

+5, 0V, 4 TTL inputs (with pull-up) 4 inputs for the R part of a
one-shot R-C timers (think 556 or 558),

only two of each on the cheap ones

R is typicaly a 250K variable resistor (to +5V)

often TTL level MIDI in and out too.

Bye.
Jasen

 

[jasen]

Jim Thompson wrote:



Lasse, that's a good idea.


As mentioned above, about 6V.

yeah, but what is it under load, and how does that compare withj what the
trackball gets when it's connected to the reguular PC.

maybe 5V from the ps/2 socket would be enough for it.

 

[jasen]

In a bit of a thread hijack, how good is Wine with odd legacy hardware?

It doesn't do harware at all, all it does is convert (some) windows software
into linux software.

linux is fairly good with legacy hardware.

I've got an ancient Noral 80188 emulator that needs a proprietory ISA
card in the PC and will only run under DOS. Would Wine let me use it on
a new PC or do you reckon that it would a be a bit too proprietory for
that?

Dosemu on the the other hand can be told to enable ranges of IO ports for
real hardware access.

Configuring dosemu can be tricky.

A new PC with an ISA slot could be expensive.

 

[Roberto Waltman]

... What I like about my old trackball is that I can roll the
ball and keep the other fingers stretched out. It's much bigger and more
healthy for the joints.

For similar reasons I'm using this one (USB):

http://www.itacsystems.com/evolutio.cfm

Roberto Waltman

[ Please reply to the group,
return address is invalid ]

 

[Joerg]

For similar reasons I'm using this one (USB):

http://www.itacsystems.com/evolutio.cfm

Nice. But it seems to not allow the rolling of the ball with the thumb
and if you do you'll have to bend the fingers. My old Trackman is laid
out so the outer side of the stretched thumb rolls the ball and the
stretched out middle or index finger can press buttons. There was never
any fatigue, even after mammoth CAD sessions.

 

[martin griffith]

Nice. But it seems to not allow the rolling of the ball with the thumb
and if you do you'll have to bend the fingers. My old Trackman is laid
out so the outer side of the stretched thumb rolls the ball and the
stretched out middle or index finger can press buttons. There was never
any fatigue, even after mammoth CAD sessions.

Hi Joerg,
Drop your Guttenbergian deadnostuff, this is the future:
http://ted.com/tedtalks/tedtalksplayer.cfm?key=j_han


martin