RE: Transferring files to Commodore MS-DOS - complete Perl script

That is awesome Michau.  Could you rename the script 'recv.pl.txt' and reattach it please? Seems that some e-mail clients don't like "executable" attachments. 

Thanks,
/Raj

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-cbm-hackers@musoftware.de [mailto:owner-cbm-hackers@musoftware.de] On Behalf Of Michal Pleban
Sent: Saturday, October 7, 2017 7:03 AM
To: cbm-hackers@musoftware.de
Subject: Transferring files to Commodore MS-DOS - complete Perl script

Hello!

Attached is the Perl script to upload files to Commodore 710 running MS-DOS 1.25. Some caveats before you use it:

Caveat #1: It is not possible to write new files to the MS-DOS boot disk. When I tried that, the drive LED turned red indicating some error, but no error message was displayed on the screen. I tried two different disks to rule out bad sectors.

You need to create a blank disk for uploading files. Insert another floppy in the drive #1 and format it using FORMAT B: command. Note that even though the 8050 drive formats disks with 500kB capacity, the new MS-DOS disk will hold only 130kB.

Caveat #2: RECV.EXE seems to have a problem downloading several files in a row - first download works fine, but the second (and all subsequent) writes the file with 2048 or 3072 byte offset. I don't know if it is a bug in RECV.EXE or MS-DOS itself. After downloading several files and erasing them, the problem seems to disappear on my disk now - maybe it only exhbitis itself if you write to an empty disk? Always compare the downloaded file size with original, and if it's a few kilobytes too big, you need to reset the machine and try again.

Here's how you use the script:

1. On the PC, run "recv.pl file_to_be_uploaded". The script will open the COM1 port and wait for the $16 character to be sent from Commodore.

2. On the Commodore, run "RECV.EXE file_name" (to place the file on your second disk, use "RECV.EXE B:file_name").

3. On the PC, you should see the data being uploaded. After receiving the whole file, on the Commodore you should see the message "TRANSMISSION COMPLETE" and the COMMAND prompt should return.

Regards,
Michau.




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