Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - Rich Walsh

Pages: [1] 2 3 ... 16
1
Programming / Re: shared memory value - Odin win32k or DosQuerySysInfo???
« on: September 30, 2023, 10:35:34 am »
Attached is an update to 'memry' that now displays both high and low memory usage. Start it before opening your browser, then watch its numbers change when you open it. Here's my before and after with Dooble.


2
Programming / Re: WPS dragged object handle
« on: September 29, 2023, 10:51:36 pm »
I am trying to identify the object that is being dragged over my window [...]

There is a value in ulItemID, put there either by the WPS or xWorkplaceShell when a WPProgram type object is being dragged. Anyone know what that value is?

For items that identify themselves as "<DRM_OBJECT,DRF_OBJECT>" ulItemID is a pointer to the object's container record. This is very useful within the WPS process but useless outside it. Indeed, there's nothing in a DRAGITEM that gives any hint as to the type of object being dragged other than to identify whether it's a file (e.g. "<DRM_OS2FILE,DRF_TEXT>"),

The only way I know of to get info about a WPS object from outside the WPS process is to use RWS. It allows you to call into the WPS using that ulItemID to query the object's attributes, execute its methods, and generally do whatever you want to inside the WPS. My only concern in this case is that it may have too much overhead to use it "live" during a drag.

FYI... RWS's runtime DLLs are included in all releases of AOS. For development, you will need the full package: https://hobbes.nmsu.edu/download/pub/os2/dev/libraries/SOM/RWS_0-80.zip

3
Programming / Re: shared memory value - Odin win32k or DosQuerySysInfo???
« on: September 28, 2023, 10:58:03 pm »
Dariusz, thanks for starting this thread. It motivated me to resurrect a long-stalled project: a memory meter that shows linear address usage the way OS/2 sees it.

All the mem monitors I've seen divide memory into Private and Shared. However, that "Shared" memory is actually two separate pieces: actual Shared memory, and the *Unassigned* memory that lies between private and shared. This address space can be assigned to either as needed. Because existing monitors lump the two together,  they will claim that your *shared* memory just decreased if any of that Unassigned memory gets reassigned for use as Private. This scenario happens constantly with the browsers and gives a mistaken impression of how they use all that memory.

Attached is 'memry.exe', a text-mode memory monitor that addresses the issue. It's a proof-of-concept that I'll eventually reimplement as an XCenter widget. Here's what it's output looks like:
Code: [Select]
| Private | Unassigned | Shared  [Used Free] |
|   150    |      207         |   155      [ 155      0  ] |

There are two display modes:
* static - enter the 'memry' command on the top line of an OS/2 window. The data line will update silently every 2.5 seconds.
* scrolling - enter the 'memry' command on the last line of an OS/2 window. The data line will update every 2.5 seconds and scroll down one line, giving you a listing of recent memory usage.

Edit: see the next posting for a newer version

4
Programming / Re: shared memory value - Odin win32k or DosQuerySysInfo???
« on: September 28, 2023, 09:24:00 pm »
Wouldn't using win2k.h introduce a dependency in win2k.sys, which is now depreciated IIRC.

Somehow this must not be the case: I've had PUMonitor running on my machine for quite a few years now. [...] and I do NOT run the win32k.sys driver on my machine.

XCenter's "Sentinel Memory Watcher" also attempts to use win32k. If it fails to open the driver, then it falls back to conventional means to generate it numbers. This 'PUMonitor' (which I'd never heard of before) almost certainly does the same. Without a device driver (or access to a backdoor into the kernel), the kernel data the util wants to use is simply not accessible to a Ring-3 app.

5
Programming / Re: Using AI to Code for OS/2
« on: September 17, 2023, 08:09:54 pm »
Spoiler Note: https://www.osbc.org/ Sent me to the Ocean State Baptist Church.

https://www.osbc.com gets you the page for the 'Open Source Business Conference' to be held in San Francisco on May 16-17, 2011. I wonder if the bot knows how we can get tickets for this event...

6
Applications / Re: ArcaOS 5.1.0 and cups
« on: September 17, 2023, 05:42:18 am »
At least I know now that it was not an "Operator Error"  :-)

Actually, I think it was "Media Error". After Win set up your NVME drive, installing AOS 5.1 should have been a non-event. Instead you still had to use all sorts of workarounds and are still having problems. Personally, I'd just start from scratch.

If you create another partition, you can reassign the letter of your current boot partition to the new one, then reinstall using a fresh download of the ISO. If it works, great - if not, you can restore the drive letter to the previous partition and be none the worse off.

BTW... did you disable HyperThreading in the BIOS?  Also, contrary to AN, I'd recommend having CSM *off* until you can demonstrate a need for it to be on.

7
Applications / Re: Drag and drop printing
« on: September 14, 2023, 08:38:23 pm »
The objects are enumerated in the order they appear in the folder _except_ that whichever icon you pointed at and dragged is placed at the top of the list. If objects A B C D are highlighted and you drag C, then the list will be C A B D.

You can test this by opening 'e.exe' then dropping the objects in its window. The f/q path of each will be listed in the order just described.

8
Applications / Re: ArcaOS 5.1 - First Impressions
« on: September 12, 2023, 11:19:59 pm »
"If no partition table exists, the ArcaOS installer will automatically create the
table as selected in the Installation Volume Manager during installation [...]"

So, good to know.

Perhaps they're using the DFSee runtime to handle the GPT layout (pure speculation).

FWIW...  'x:\sys\install\EspUtil.exe' is the pgm that formats and populates the ESP. It has plenty of options for DIY'ers but nothing I saw to do repartitioning.

Quote
Checking the BIOS boot order I found AN Launcher and selected the install partition, boot started and stopped fairly quickly showing os2lvm.dmd on screen and the "OS/2 cannot operate your hard disk..." message.

Not sure where to go from there... all partitions look good in miniLVM, chkdsk does not report any problems.

If the system can't match the boot drive to a letter, you'll get that error. So, just to confirm,,, when booted into the installer and running MiniLVM, does the target (install) drive have the expected letter? Does that match the boot drive referenced in the target's 'config.sys'?

Next, is everything (ESP and boot partition) on the same drive? When split across drives there's a chance that the disk numbering is changing during bootup. Ensure that the machine considers the disk with the ESP to be Drive 1 (i.e. the first in its list of hard drives).

BTW... having the bootup hang after the first reboot, just as it's about to go graphical, has happened to me many times. This could just be voodoo, but in at least some cases the target drive's 'os2.ini' was still marked read-only. Resetting that flag then rebooting seemed to get the install going again. Take this with a grain of salt...

9
Applications / Re: ArcaOS 5.1 - First Impressions
« on: September 11, 2023, 06:47:11 am »
After the Windows install I retried installing ArcaOS 5.1 which failed as previously however I did notice that the GPT driver got installed this time. Could that be because Windows 11 had created some partitions on the drive?

Yes. Your drive was probably blank without any partitioning scheme in place. Since there weren't any GPT disks to be found, gpt.flt unloaded itself. OTOH, Windows recognized the situation and created the GPT infrastructure and ESP that AOS used subsequently.

While I was with AN, I wrote a util to create a GPT disk from a blank or MBR disk but it wasn't included in 5.1. I don't see an alternative in the distro, so people may have to use Windows or Linux for that task.

10
Applications / Re: ArcaOS 5.1 - First Impressions
« on: September 09, 2023, 07:36:07 am »
My understanding is that on some systems, in UEFI mode,some hardware is left to the OS to init, unlike CSM mode where the BIOS takes care of initializing the hardware, the CD/DVD in this case and is the reason that leaving CSM enabled is recommended, though it varies on the system.

Your logic has a big hole in it. How can the machine rely on an OS to initialize the CD/DVD when it needs to use the CD/DVD to boot that OS? What you say may be true for non-boot components (it would be nice to know which and on what machines) but it seems highly unlikely in this case (short of a major bug in the firmware). As I mentioned, Peter can confirm this by booting a DVD known to have a UEFI bootloader.

FWIW... dfsee.com says its bootable CD uses "Free DOS" to boot (clearly CSM based) and makes no mention of UEFI.

11
Applications / Re: ArcaOS 5.1 - First Impressions
« on: September 09, 2023, 06:31:11 am »
I booted the system using DFSee - how I discovered that CSM needs to be Enabled to boot from CD/DVD on this system

It sounds like you and a bunch of other people are about to run into all sorts of avoidable problems for lack of some basic info.

First... there is no such thing as a "UEFI CD/DVD" or a "[CSM] CD/DVD", there are only UEFI and CSM *bootloaders*. The menu gives you a choice of which one you want to use on the mounted optical disk. If the DFSee disk you burned doesn't include a UEFI bootloader (not your doing), then it won't boot in UEFI mode and you'll be forced to use the CSM bootloader that it does have. Had you tried booting an AOS5.1 DVD, its very likely you wouldn't have encountered this problem since it contains both.

Next... TTBOMK, DFSee has never been updated to fully support ArcaOS's GPT implementation. In its current state, DFSee can read and write the entire disk *except* for the partition tables which it can only _read_. Without additional code that talks to the GPT driver (GPT.FLT) and coordinates its activity with LVM, it can not be used as an OS/2 GPT partition editor. You can still use it's other features such as creating partition images or copying them to a new partition, but in the latter case that new partition will have to be created by MiniLVM.

Quote
Do I reinstall Windows11 or copy existing install from the 128Gb SSD using DFSee?

Good question :)  Do you have a Win11 DVD or is this a preinstalled system? If you have an install disk, then do a new install to the NVME drive, letting Win create the ESP (EFI System partition). After it is up and running, then install 5.1 (it isn't at all fussy, as Martin discovered).

Be aware that the issue of Secure Boot will come up during installation. My impression is that if you decline it, your system will be "disadvantaged" in some way (you'll have to check the MS docs to see if this is really the case). If you opt for it, you'll have to register AN's Secure Boot key with your system for the two to coexist. (Doing so manually is pretty easy on a desktop system and likely impossible on a laptop. There's a yet-to-be-released utility that will make it fairly easy on any type of system.)

OTOH, if you have to copy the partitions to the new drive, you're going to need a lot of in-depth knowledge of how Win navigates a GPT drive and how to use 'bcdedit' (or whatever may have replaced it). I'd suggest an exhaustive search on the topic of moving Win11 from one drive to another (it ain't easy!).

Quote
What creates the EFI System partition and the starting and finishing Fsp + GPT partitions

Typically, the util that lays out the disk creates the partition tables and headers, while the OS installer will create the ESP if needed. In AOS 5.1, use the two options on MiniLVM's 'System' menu to create the ESP. It's very likely that your NVME will come formatted as GPT but probably without an ESP.

Quote
should I copy those as well as the Windows partitions?

God forbid! Happily, no self-respecting tool would let you.

12
Setup & Installation / Re: UEFI: Dual Boot - Windows 11 and ArcaOS 5.1
« on: September 08, 2023, 01:10:28 am »
Which is the difference in functionality between this two?
- ArcaOS (C:) = \EFI\OS2\OS2LDR.EFI C:
- ArcaOS (*) = \EFI\OS2\OS2LDR.EFI

Can I delete the second one? or does it offer something different without the C: ?

If you specify a drive letter, OS2LDR will boot that drive. If you don't, OS2LDR will display a list of OS/2 partitions that may be bootable so you can choose one.

Here's something people may find interesting: if the list includes an existing BIOS-based installation, try selecting it. Ignore what you see (or rather, what you don't see) on the screen and give it a few moments. You may be pleasantly surprised. (If things seem to stop, try pressing Enter.)

13
Setup & Installation / Re: UEFI: Dual Boot - Windows 11 and ArcaOS 5.1
« on: September 07, 2023, 06:14:38 am »
Is it real? Was it that easy?

Yes, this is exactly the way it's supposed to be: no drama.

Quote
6) It shows a "AN Launcher" where I can select ArcaOS or Windows... (Dual_007.jpg) The only thing is that Windows shows like "old_x86".

I just want to know how to change the names of the options on the "AN Launcher", so I can rename one to "ArcaOS 5.1" and the "Windows 11" the other.

Launcher's Help screen gives a brief how-to; here's a slightly more detailed explanation:
Use MiniLVM to assign a drive letter to your ESP (e.g. 'U:'), then navigate to U:\EFI\BOOT\LAUNCHER.CFG. Open it and edit the "[menu]' section. Each line is in the form "<menu text> = <program>.EFI [options]". Here's my menu:

[menu]
ArcaOS (N:) = \EFI\OS2\OS2LDR.EFI N:
ArcaOS (C:) = \EFI\OS2\OS2LDR.EFI C:
ArcaOS (*) = \EFI\OS2\OS2LDR.EFI
Win11 = \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi
Kubuntu22 = \EFI\ubuntu\shimx64.efi
Shell = \EFI\Boot\shell.efi
Help = ??


14
Applications / Re: Csm2Uefi migration tool (updated)
« on: September 06, 2023, 10:45:39 pm »
Pardon my ignorance: Is Cube this file https://hobbes.nmsu.edu/?detail=%2Fpub%2Fos2%2Futil%2Fstartup%2FCUBE_3-30.zip?

Yes and no... CUBE is a REXX script for modifying text files like config.sys. It has been updated many times, most recently by me. It is used extensively by the AOS installer, and apparently by RPM scripts because BWW has converted it to an .exe and put a copy in \usr\bin. I'd consider this exe and the cube.cmd it's based on to be the "official" release. It's version is 3.0.

The package on hobbes appears to be a fork based on an outdated version. The package's author has updated it in various ways and greatly expanded its scope. Until you mentioned it, I wasn't aware it existed so I can't comment on its reliability. Until that's established, I wouldn't put that version on the PATH before the "official" versions.

For your reference, I've attached the "official" version containing 'cube.cmd' and its documentation.

15
Applications / Re: ArcaOS 5.1 - First Impressions
« on: September 05, 2023, 11:32:04 pm »
I was able to sort of get windowed DOS sessions working. Full screen DOS sessions work fine for me now.

You didn't identify whether you're booting in CSM or UEFI mode - it makes a world of difference. If UEFI, you've got a real problem; if CSM, this is par-for-the-course.

Pages: [1] 2 3 ... 16