Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!rutgers!uwvax!oddjob!mimsy!haven!uvaarpa!hudson!bessel.acc.Virginia.EDU!gl8f
From: gl8f@bessel.acc.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Networking, ST's and Spectre 128
Summary: midi networking?!
Message-ID: <594@hudson.acc.virginia.edu>
Date: 29 Sep 88 02:36:37 GMT
References:  <3602@druhi.ATT.COM> <6424@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu>
Sender: news@hudson.acc.virginia.edu
Reply-To: gl8f@bessel.acc.Virginia.EDU (Greg Lindahl)
Organization: Dept. of Astronomy, University of Virginia
Lines: 33

In article <6424@batcomputer.tn.cornell.edu> braner@tcgould.tn.cornell.edu (Moshe Braner) writes:
> [stuff deleted]
>
>What's new in the field of ST networking through the MIDI ports?
>

i haven't been writing any networking code, but i have been looking into
MIDI networking. you could use a true ring topology, with packets being
received and retransmitted around the ring. this would require interrupt
driven receiving and sending through the MIDI port. at the moment, the MIDI
ACIA chip is configured to do interrupt-driven receiving, and busy-waits
for sends. this is sub-optimal.

the 6850, however, can be set to another mode which interrupts on both
receipt and sending. the midi and keyboard acias share an interrupt; therefore,
you would have to replace the current handler with a new one which checked
for more conditions. this would eat a little more CPU than the present
routine.

anyone want to write a TCP/IP sort of network? you could do print sharing
using a memory buffer, and disk sharing by using a GEMDOS-level driver.

if you wanted to get really fancy, you could also allow the rs232 as a
device, to link rings, or over Bitnet or a conferencing system such
as Genie. and maybe you can rig the parallel port to send and receive...
or... or...

greg

disclaimer: this message does not resemble reality in any way, shape, or
            form.
Greg Lindahl                              internet:  gl8f@virginia.edu
U Va Dept. of Astronomy                   bitnet:    gl8f@virginia.bitnet