Roadshow 68K - Needs your support!

[Olaf Barthel]

Originally Posted by ppill

A GUI for a stack that supports DHCP and Zero conf from the get-go? Surely most of the people nowadays have some modem/router thingy that supports DHCP.

Some impressive speeds but like others have mentioned a 1200 + PCMCIA card would be of interest to a greater crowd.

If you can wait until the weekend, when I have a little more spare time at hand, I could rig up a test environment with an A1200HD and a PCMCIA networking card. I haven't used that kind of configuration in years, and it might take a bit to assemble all the bits and pieces.

A legal TCP/IP stack that support autoconfiguration (fire and forget style), faster that the rest and for an affordable price? Hell yes!

And how's the memory footprint?

The software itself needs about 260K of main memory, and you need to set aside some memory for the networking card's send/receive buffers. Each buffer is 1.5K in size, and you should need at least 8-16 buffers per queue. That gives 2 * 16 * 1.5K = 48K. Let's say a total of 360K minimum should give you a working TCP/IP stack.

[Olaf Barthel]

Originally Posted by vulture

Also another question, right now we have to disable amitcp or miami to be able to run whdload games. Will roadshow have the same issue?

I have no idea why this should be a requirement. If WHDLoad won't let you run it with a TCP/IP stack present, it might be a technical reason, or a question of policy. Without further information to explain the rationale I'm afraid I cannot answer your question

[ppill]

Originally Posted by Olaf Barthel

If you can wait until the weekend, when I have a little more spare time at hand, I could rig up a test environment with an A1200HD and a PCMCIA networking card. I haven't used that kind of configuration in years, and it might take a bit to assemble all the bits and pieces.

That would be great

The software itself needs about 260K of main memory, and you need to set aside some memory for the networking card's send/receive buffers. Each buffer is 1.5K in size, and you should need at least 8-16 buffers per queue. That gives 2 * 16 * 1.5K = 48K. Let's say a total of 360K minimum should give you a working TCP/IP stack.

That seems pretty lean. Thanks for the info.

[Olaf Barthel]

Originally Posted by ppill

I'd be ready to pay somewhere around 15-25 euros. And it sounds great. Is there a demo available?

Oops, missed that one: no, I have not yet built a demo distribution. The code has a demo mode included, though. Until about two weeks ago I hadn't given releasing the 68k version much thought. So much time had passed since I last tried to get it released that the subject was no longer on my mind.

[Toni Wilen]

Originally Posted by vulture

! Also another question, right now we have to disable amitcp or miami to be able to run whdload games. Will roadshow have the same issue? Is this something the whdload devs should fix or is it simply one of those things that can't be fixed because of the way things work? Thx!

It is not TCP/IP stack thats the problem but NIC (or any "alien" device) that can generate "random" hardware interrupt requests, for example interrupt that tells new network packet has been received.

OS disabled and unknown interrupt (unknown to whdload) coming: system freeze.

[Olaf Barthel]

Originally Posted by Toni Wilen

It is not TCP/IP stack thats the problem but NIC (or any "alien" device) that can generate "random" hardware interrupt requests, for example interrupt that tells new network packet has been received.

OS disabled and unknown interrupt (unknown to whdload) coming: system freeze.

Well, that's as good a reason as can be expected under the circumstances. Some level triggered hardware interrupt signals will stick around until the conditition that triggered them has been taken care of. Simply unhooking the int2/int6 handler chain will not help, as the interrupt condition will persist and the system might just stall until it has been serviced. I remember wrestling with this kind of issue on the Concierto sound card driver

So this probably means that Roadshow won't be able to function completely under these circumstances either. But it might be possible to temporarily switch the networking interfaces offline while WHDLoad is doing its stuff.

[ppill]

Originally Posted by Olaf Barthel

So this probably means that Roadshow won't be able to function completely under these circumstances either. But it might be possible to temporarily switch the networking interfaces offline while WHDLoad is doing its stuff.

You can define dos commands (via tooltypes or in a global prefs file) that are run before WHDLoad starts and when it exits. So something like IPUp and IPDown would do the trick.

I assume you can signal Roadshow to quit via cli?

[Olaf Barthel]

Originally Posted by ppill

You can define dos commands (via tooltypes or in a global prefs file) that are run before WHDLoad starts and when it exits. So something like IPUp and IPDown would do the trick.

There's a shell command for that, called "ConfigureNetInterface". It also allows you to change network interface parameters such as IPv4 addresses or the DHCP status at runtime.

I assume you can signal Roadshow to quit via cli?

Yes, there is a command for that, too. It's called "NetShutdown", and it will attempt to cleanly shut down the network interfaces, and clients. You can test in a script file whether it has succeeded, and you can tell it how long to wait for the network to be shut down.

Does it come with a SDK supporting things like getaddrinfo() ?
Then I'm all in!

[ppill]

Originally Posted by Olaf Barthel

There's a shell command for that, called "ConfigureNetInterface". It also allows you to change network interface parameters such as IPv4 addresses or the DHCP status at runtime.

Yes, there is a command for that, too. It's called "NetShutdown", and it will attempt to cleanly shut down the network interfaces, and clients. You can test in a script file whether it has succeeded, and you can tell it how long to wait for the network to be shut down.

Great What would be the best way to check whether Roadshow is running? 'version bsdsocket.library'?

[Olaf Barthel]

Originally Posted by jostberg

Does it come with a SDK supporting things like getaddrinfo() ?

It wouldn't be much of an SDK without it, would it?

The SDK also contains the source code of all the shell commands that are part of Roadshow, e.g. the ConfigureNetInterface and NetShutdown commands I already mentioned.

[alexh]

Olaf (if you don't already have one) see if you can wangle a Zorro III Deneb from Michael Boehmer

http://www.e3b.de

He's a nice bloke, and you're a legend plus you may be able to throw some business his way if everyone wants a Deneb + 100Mbit USB->Ethernet adapter + Roadshow.

If you need one I can send you a supported 100Mbit USB->Ethernet adapter. Got several here.

[Olaf Barthel]

Originally Posted by ppill

Great What would be the best way to check whether Roadshow is running? 'version bsdsocket.library'?

The best way is to enter "GetNetStatus". The command will show you whether Roadshow is running or not, and if it's running, which parts of the network are configured and operational. For example, whether the default route is set, if DNS servers are configured, etc.

The "GetNetStatus" command can also be used to check if specific parts of the configuration are present, and this information can be used in AmigaDOS or Installer scripts.

[cosmicfrog]

price point of £10 sounds good to me

loveing the tec talk, though real world tests and a test on an a1200 would be nice to see in next week or so

[Cammy]

I think $10/£10/€10 or around that kind of price is just about right. Asking much more than that for a download is just inviting piracy. Just look at how many people spread around WHDLoad keys, and that only costs $30/£15/€20! If you lurk around IRC, forums and newsgroups enough you notice this going on (I won't rat anyone out, don't worry guys, I'll let karma or your conscience catch up with you). Try to use a system that makes online payment easy with an instant download and hopefully people will simply pay for it rather than going to the small amount of extra effort required to get a pirated copy of it. I just want to help you increase your sales.

[cv643d]

I think you will earn some extra money from this for many years to come if you will sell it, wont make you a millionaire but any free money is good money IMHO

9 euro sounds like a great price.

You could set up an automatic webshop with Paypal that enables download zone for x amount of days/minutes or a use once download code. Add a wiki and you wont need to write manual either, just sit back and enjoy the flow of cash into your account

[source]

I woud be interested hopefully it will work through isb ethernet with deneb as well as mediator pci ethernet.

[vulture]

Maybe when roadshow is released we may harass the whdload authors a bit to include a roadshow related tooltype that'll kill the connection upon whdload start and bring it back when quit. Sure, someone might be able to achieve just the same by creating start and stop scripts and assigning them to a shortcut via fkey. I too believe that 10 euros is too low a price for an actively developed tcp/ip stack. Is 15 too much guys? What do you think?

[TCD]

Originally Posted by vulture

Maybe when roadshow is released we may harass the whdload authors a bit to include a roadshow related tooltype that'll kill the connection upon whdload start and bring it back when quit

Seems like someone already did

Originally Posted by whdload.prefs

;ExecuteStartup=SYS:Rexxc/rx offline.rexx ;command to execute on WHDLoad startup
;ExecuteCleanup=SYS:Rexxc/rx online.rexx ;command to execute on WHDLoad exit

Means that you can easily do that already

[vulture]

great, I wasn't aware of that capability, thx