diff --git a/apps/pcx86/1983/adventmath/README.md b/apps/pcx86/1983/adventmath/README.md index b5698a960..fdb2f5959 100644 --- a/apps/pcx86/1983/adventmath/README.md +++ b/apps/pcx86/1983/adventmath/README.md @@ -36,12 +36,12 @@ The contents of their ZIP archive contained: -rwxr-xr-x@ 1 Jeff staff 13 Dec 24 1996 Sn -rwxr-xr-x@ 1 Jeff staff 369 Dec 24 1996 Topten -It's unfortunate that the archive did not contain a complete dump of the original "Adventures in Math" diskette. -It's especially disturbing that all the files in the archive are dated "Dec 24 1996", calling into question which, -if any, of these files are authentic. +It was unfortunate that the archive did not contain a complete dump of the original "Adventures in Math" +diskette, and that all the files in the archive were dated "Dec 24 1996", calling into question the authenticity +of the files. After digging around a bit more on the Internet Archive, I discovered that -[A Large Collection of DOS Collections](https://archive.org/details/large_dos_collection_2013_08) contains: +[A Large Collection of DOS Collections](https://archive.org/details/large_dos_collection_2013_08) contained: - DOS Collection v0.7/DVD1/Adventures In Math (1983)(Ibm).zip - main torrent/1983/Adventures in Math (1983)(IBM) [Educational].zip @@ -78,10 +78,10 @@ And in the second ZIP file: -rw-r--r--@ 1 Jeff staff 369 Sep 17 1999 Topten -rw-r--r--@ 1 Jeff staff 170 Jan 22 2011 file_id.diz -I decided to start with the contents of the second ZIP file, since the timestamps of the most of the files +I decided to start with the contents of the second ZIP file, since the timestamps of most of the files appeared to be legitimate. -One strange file common to *all* these archives is **MONOCODE.000**. Dumping that file revealed: +One strange file common to *all* the archives was **MONOCODE.000**. Dumping that file revealed: 00000c60 20 4d 4f 4e 4f 50 4f 4c 59 20 69 73 20 61 20 72 | MONOPOLY is a r| 00000c70 65 67 69 73 74 65 72 65 64 20 74 72 61 64 65 6d |egistered tradem| @@ -93,15 +93,14 @@ One strange file common to *all* these archives is **MONOCODE.000**. Dumping th 00000cd0 20 44 6f 6e 20 50 68 69 6c 6c 69 70 20 47 69 62 | Don Phillip Gib| 00000ce0 73 6f 6e 20 5b e8 96 7d 03 35 2e 31 b8 5d 00 50 |son [..}.5.1.].P| -So at some point, unrelated ("MONOPOLY") files were mingled with this game. I deleted the file. +So at some point, unrelated "MONOPOLY" files were mingled with this game. I deleted **MONOCODE.000**. -Another unexpected file is **BASICA.EXE** (54277 bytes) from 1999. It seems unlikely that IBM would have distributed +Another unexpected file was **BASICA.EXE** (54277 bytes) from 1999. It seems unlikely that IBM would have distributed *any* BASIC binary with this game, because DOS was a prerequisite, and at the time, all versions of DOS included BASIC. -IBM's PC-DOS shipped with **BASICA.COM**, and OEM versions of DOS shipped with either **GWBASIC.EXE** or **BASIC.EXE**. +IBM's PC-DOS shipped with **BASICA.COM** and OEM versions of DOS shipped with either **GWBASIC.EXE** or **BASIC.EXE**. The closest matching binary I'd seen up to this point was **BASICA.EXE** from [COMPAQ DOS 1.12](/disks/pcx86/dos/compaq/1.12/) -(54304 bytes). And sure enough, examining the strings contained inside this **BASICA.EXE** revealed that it was a close -relative: +(54304 bytes). And sure enough, dumping the strings inside this **BASICA.EXE** revealed that it was a close relative: The COMPAQ Personal Computer BASIC Version 1.13 @@ -109,11 +108,8 @@ relative: It's safe to say that IBM would not have distributed a COMPAQ binary; if IBM had distributed any BASIC binary at all, it would have been their own **BASICA.COM**. Of course, the problem with IBM's **BASICA.COM** is that it also requires -an IBM PC with ROM BASIC installed, which is why some people would have preferred the COMPAQ version: it has no ROM -dependencies. - -Anyway, I've deleted **BASICA.EXE**. The proper thing to do -- and what any purchaser of this game would have to do -- -is boot a machine with an appropriate version of DOS and use the BASIC binary included with DOS to run this game. +an IBM PC with ROM BASIC installed, which is why some people would have preferred the COMPAQ binary: it had no ROM +dependencies. Anyway, I deleted **BASICA.EXE**. Finally, there was **FILE_ID.DIZ**: @@ -147,13 +143,13 @@ and **TOPTEN**: Z[z],55677,LARGE,07-24-81 [z],55197,LARGE,07-23-81 -All those files have been deleted as well, leaving 8 files dated "Aug 11 1983". Next, I used the PCjs -[DiskDump](/modules/diskdump/) utility to create a disk image from a directory ("archive/disk") containing just +All those files were deleted as well, leaving 8 files dated "Aug 11 1983". Next, I used the PCjs +[DiskDump](/modules/diskdump/) utility to create a disk image from a directory ("archive/disk") containing those files: diskdump --dir=archive/disk --format=json --output=ADVENTMATH100.json --manifest -The resulting 160Kb disk image contains: +Here's a directory listing of the resulting 160Kb disk image: Volume in drive A is PCJS ORG Directory of A:\ @@ -168,10 +164,10 @@ The resulting 160Kb disk image contains: SN 13 8-11-83 12:00p 8 File(s) 108544 bytes free -And this disk has now been added to the PCjs [IBM PC Disk Library](/disks/pcx86/) as "Adventures in Math (1983)". +This disk has now been added to the PCjs [IBM PC Disk Library](/disks/pcx86/) as "Adventures in Math (1983)". -I originally selected an [IBM PC (Model 5150, 64Kb) with Color Display](/devices/pcx86/machine/5150/cga/64kb/), -which boots PC-DOS 2.00 by default. However, in the course of starting the game, it would crash: +To run the game, I originally selected an [IBM PC (Model 5150, 64Kb) with Color Display](/devices/pcx86/machine/5150/cga/64kb/), +which boots PC-DOS 2.00 by default. However, in the course of starting the game, it crashed: ![ADVENTMATH-CRASH](ADVENTMATH-CRASH.png) @@ -183,9 +179,28 @@ It appeared to run fine with 256Kb of RAM, but these were IBM's "System Requirem > One diskette drive -so I reconfigured the machine to boot PC-DOS 1.00, which required less RAM than PC-DOS 2.00, and that appeared to be -sufficient. Note that the game was released in October 1983, well after the March 1983 release of PC-DOS 2.00, so -either it wasn't tested with PC-DOS 2.00 on a 64Kb machine, or the error is a PCjs anomaly. +so I reconfigured the machine to boot PC-DOS 1.00, which requires less RAM than PC-DOS 2.00, and that worked. +Note that the game was released in October 1983, well after the March 1983 release of PC-DOS 2.00, so it should +have been tested with PC-DOS 2.00 on a 64Kb machine, but perhaps it wasn't. + +The machine on this page is configured with the following "autoType" sequence: + + autoType: 8-10-81\\rb:\\ra:basica castle\\r + +which translates to: + + 8-10-81 [enter an arbitrary date] + b: [switch to drive B:] + a:basica castle [run BASICA on drive A: and load CASTLE.BAS on drive B:] + +This is the preferred way of "demo'ing" software with PCjs: loading unmodified disk images using the minimum +"system requirements" and automatically performing the same series of commands that the original owner of that +hardware and software would have performed. + +An alternative approach, adopted by the Internet Archive, involves creating customized disk images and machine +configurations for each application. This offers some simplicity, because the software has been modified to work +in a common configuration, but it becomes difficult if not impossible to isolate the original software distribution +or run it in other machine configurations. References ----------