Guru Meditating in style

[Photon]

A silly idea popped into my head.

The blinking red Guru box certainly works as a very, very, VERY (too) clear warning that something went wrong!

Was just wondering if anyone can think of a patch to style it to look a little more friendly or nicer, or even skip the "reset and blink" thing altogether and show a little requester with the guru number (like for some software failures) instead. Or something.

Any takers?

Maybe there's a patch on Aminet already and I just don't know about it? Do I need to burn a new Kickstart ROM?

[thomas]

The problem is that if a dead-end alert occurs, the system is considered so unstable that a requester most likely cannot be opened any more (or not yet; IIRC the alert is shown *after* a system reset). Surely you could patch the alert routine to do something different.

This program does it for example: http://aminet.net/package/util/boot/NewAlertH
It still has the blinking frame, but a more useful text.

[James]

Behold the BWOD:




Thanks to the NoGuru patch from MCP... It doesn`t catch every crash though.

http://mcp.a1k.org/mcp.html

[Hewitson]

It's a bit hard to read but the Gates picture is funny

[Photon]

Actually, I might also be looking for a monitor/"software cartridge" that opens up on any trapped exception. Should work from OCS/1MB and up, but I'll take an old simple one that doesn't do cache CPUs if it has a small memory footprint.

[matthey]

There may have been a BlizKick patch that patched the Guru requester but I don't think that works in a burned ROM. Piru also created SmartCrash which is executed after booting.

https://www.sintonen.fi/sw/SmartCrash-1.3.3.lha

More information like the offending program name is given if SegTracker is installed.

[Photon]

Well, the stylish Guru thingy is just for something more useful and better looking, and perhaps even allows a choice of reset or not, instead of waiting, clicking, booting.

The monitor thingy would just be something I run separately, no need for being in ROM or resident as long as it's in memory.

[Minuous]

Sounds like you are looking for something like GOMF or AlPatch...

[Lonewolf10]

I'm pretty sure I have some AMOS Basic code that calls up the Guru containing *any* text of your choice. It's been a while since I have used it, so it could just be a very cool 'fake' Guru. I'll have to check it out over the weekend to find out which it is.
I suppose you could write your own Guru in ASM and just redirect the normal guru to it (before it actually does anything) by finding the start of the Guru code.

[Photon]

Fake gurus have been done 185632 times. That is not the guru I am looking for.

[Michael Sykes]

Does MPCs guru patch have any bugs?

[Lonewolf10]

Originally Posted by Photon

Fake gurus have been done 185632 times. That is not the guru I am looking for.

Ok, I couldn't wait until tomorrow. The following AMOS code creates the yellow (recoverable) Guru with no options:

'**********************************************
'*                  Guru.AMOS                 *
'*          ©1992 by Volker Stepprath         *
'*  Calls a DisplayAlert ( Guru Meditation )  *
'**********************************************
'
Amos To Back 
'
'**** Define text in display ****
'
T$=Chr$(0)+Chr$(75)+Chr$(38)+" No panic ... "
T$=T$+"This GURU was called up by AMOS !"+Chr$(0)
'
'**** Call up DisplayAlert ( Guru ) ****   
'
Areg(0)=Varptr(T$)
Dreg(1)=80
XALERT=Intcall(-90)
'
If XALERT Then Print "left button" Else Print "right button"
'
Amos To Front 
End

I'm sure you can see what's happening, but just to be clear the code sets the text pointer in A0, a timer(?) in D1 and then calls Intuition. I don't know what -90 is off the top of my head...

*** looks up -90 for Intuition.library ***


Aha! It's DisplayAlert.

DisplayAlert:

D0=Alert Number
A0=String pointer (string has to be null terminated, of course)
D1=Height (in pixels/lines?)

[modrobert]

Originally Posted by Minuous

Sounds like you are looking for something like GOMF or AlPatch...

Yes, for WB 1.3 or lower, try GOMF.

http://aminet.net/package/util/boot/Gomf

Gomf stands for "Get Outa My Face", a phrase many a programmer has mumbled
when a Guru alert appears unexpectedly. This interesting little program
can generally make the Guru go away and allow you to clean up and shutdown
more cleanly.

There was a later commercial version, GOMF 3.x something, where you can use a "hardware button" addon.

I suspect this is similar hardware design as the level7 interrupt button for HRTMon (and ASM-One).

[Photon]

LoneWolf10: again, I'm not looking to _generate_ a good looking Guru. Just see a better looking one when I get one.

Checking out GOMF!

[modrobert]

I tried to find GOMF 3.0 on the EAB FTP server but no luck, looks like it is on its way into tosec.

GOMF! The Gurubuster v3.0 (1988-09-07)(Hypertek - Silicon Springs)(CA).adf

I found the manual scanned here (PDF, TXT):

https://archive.org/details/G.O.M.F....ilicon_Springs


Still remember the logo..hehe.



If someone sit on this release, please zone it.

[Hewitson]

I have located GOMF 2.1 if it's of any interest.

http://janeway.exotica.org.uk/release.php?id=30080

[Photon]

Gomf1.0 is not enough, well, since I use 2.0 and up for using utilities etc mostly it has to work on that. I don't really care about guru messages when running games/demos since then you have to reboot between games and sometimes demos anyway!

I don't really care about seeing the guru message when getting it using the Amiga OS either, actually. The number of times (over a decade of use) when I've had need to know "what kind of guru and at which address" can be counted on one hand.

If you get a guru, you know it, because like, the machine resets... so really, patching the guru entry point with something that boots directly would probably do me. For kick 2.0-3.1 is OK.

I've tried to provoke a guru that the requester on kick 3.1 can't handle, but haven't succeeded with a few simple tries.

Sometimes you get a guru as an extra gift when clicking either requester button and sometimes not. So I guess I'm also looking for tips to do a little program that tests the resident patch.

So now I/you should be able to test patches. Any tips for a patch? I guess it's some vector in early boot process.

Here is ProvokeGuru31 if someone wants it, which causes a guru that is not captured by Gomf1.0 under Kick/WB 3.1, and causes a normal guru on kick < 2.0 (I guess) and causes the requester on kick >=2.0.

Hmm... sadistic idea... what happens if you put JMP 1 at the trap vector for word at odd address?

Originally Posted by Hewitson

I have located GOMF 2.1 if it's of any interest.

http://janeway.exotica.org.uk/release.php?id=30080

EDIT: Updated ProvokeGuru31 to give a guru $8000003D that neither the OS nor GOMF2.1 can handle. I.e. should give straight guru on all Amigas AFAIK. So now I/you can test patches! I guess it's some vector in early boot process. Toni?

[modrobert]

Originally Posted by Photon

Gomf1.0 is not enough, well, since I use 2.0 and up for using utilities etc mostly it has to work on that. I don't really care about guru messages when running games/demos since then you have to reboot between games and sometimes demos anyway!

GOMF was more or less made defunct after WB 2.0 and up where you get a requester, hence no releases after 1988 (it seems).

[daxb]

Originally Posted by Michael Sykes

Does MPCs guru patch have any bugs?

As far as I know there are no bugs but as Thomas mentioned already the system is in a very unstable condition when a guru happens. So any later action done is user risk. Sooner or later you get a system freeze.

[Photon]

modrobert: That's kind of what I wrote So now I'm looking for a way to code a resident program that patches the guru box trigger and boots directly instead. That, also, only has to work on >= kick 2.0 since that's what I use for productivity.