Oberon (TM) for MS-DOS Systems, Version 2.0 / 3.1, 1. 4. 93 Copyright (C) 1993 by Institut fuer Computersysteme ETH Zuerich Introduction Oberon is both a programming language and an operating environment. It is the final outcome of a research project whose aim was an extensible, highly integrated and compact operating platform for single-user personal workstations. The original project was launched and carried out by N. Wirth and J. Gutknecht for the Ceres workstation. Ported versions of the Oberon language and system are now available for numerous commercial machines, among them MacIntosh, IBM RS/6000, DEC station, SPARC station and IBM PC/386 compatibles. Version 3 is an object-oriented evolution of the original system. It supports a generic mechanism for the management of end-user objects and comes with a graphical user interface called Gadgets (TM). Literature The following family of books on Oberon is available from Addison-Wesley company: The Oberon System- User Guide and Programmer's Manual, by M. Reiser Programming in Oberon- Steps beyond Modula-2, by M. Reiser and N. Wirth Project Oberon- The Design of an Operating System and Compiler, by N. Wirth and J. Gutknecht A detailed user's and programmer's guide to the Gadgets system and a tool assisting with the migration to Version 3 are included in the online documentation. MS-DOS Oberon Oberon for IBM PC/386 compatibles is henceforth called MS-DOS Oberon. Even though MS-DOS Oberon is highly congruent with the original system as described in the above listed literature, there are some preconditions and implementation specialties to know. The following sections summarize these points. They also include a summary of principles of operation and an installation guide. Hardware Requirements 1) Intel 80386DX- or 80386SX-processor 2) 2 megabytes or more of main memory 3) mouse with 2 or 3 buttons and driver 4) VGA-board Software Requirements 1) DOS version 3.3 or 5.0 2) HIMEM.SYS driver for extended memory access Disclaimer Permission to use, copy, modify or distribute this software and its documentation for any purpose is hereby granted without fee, provided that the above copyright notice appear in all copies and that both that copyright notice and this permission notice appear in supporting documentation, and that the name of ETH not be used in advertising or publicity pertaining to distribution of the software without specific, written prior permission. ETH disclaims all warranties with regard to this software, including all implied special, indirect or consequential damages or any damages whatsoever resulting from loss of use, data or profits, whether in an action of contract, negligence or other tortious action, arising out of or in connection with the use or performance of this software. Contact Address MS-DOS Oberon Institute for Computer Systems ETH Zentrum CH-8092 Zuerich E-mail: Oberon@inf.ethz.ch E-Fax: +41 1 2519678 Acknowledgement The MS-DOS Oberon project has partly been supported by IBM research laboratory, Rueschlikon Switzerland. It has been carried out by A. R. Disteli. Principles of Operation and Installation Guide Mode of Operation MS-DOS Oberon principally operates in 386 protected mode in high memory above 1 MB. Below the 1 MB limit are video-RAM, extender, system loader, Oberon kernel and the procedure activation stack. The extender handles interrupts and DOS system calls. It also bootstraps the Oberon module loader and starts the Oberon system. Restriction Currently, no other software running in protected mode or V86 mode must be installed simultaneously with Oberon. This restriction applies in particular to expanded memory managers like EMM386. Also SMARTDRIVE should not be installed. File System MS-DOS Oberon maintains its own DOS file directory. It contains all Oberon files that are created at Oberon run-time. Note that Oberon file names may be up to 31 characters long and may contain an arbitrary number of part- separators ".". Oberon translates such file names internally into aliasing DOS file names and maintains a translation table. In addition, Oberon offers commands System.CopyFromDOS and System.CopyToDOS, allowing file copy from arbitrary DOS directories to Oberon and vice versa. Template: System.CopyFromDOS a:/MyDir/Filename.Ext => Oberonname~ Diskettes Data transfer from and to diskettes is supported by module Backup. Data on Oberon diskettes are stored in a private format that supports full Oberon file names. Use commands SetDriveA and SetDriveB to set the current drive. Keyboard The following table shows how to generate special characters under Oberon control. special character key mark viewer F1 (* Setup *) no scroll F2 (* used in program Draw *) double s F7 escape ESC ae ctrl-a oe ctrl-o ue ctrl-u Ae F8 Oe F9 Ue F10 ctrl-shift-del ctrl-break (* keyboard interrupt *) If the appropriate keyboard driver is installed, ae, oe, ue, Ae, Oe, Ue and double-s can also be typed directly. Mouse The standard Oberon user interface is based on a 3-button mouse and on the following interpretation of button clicks: Primary clicks: left: set caret middle: execute right: select Interclicks while selecting (holding down the right button): left: delete selected data middle: copy selected data to caret left & middle: undo interclick Alternatively, interclicking left/middle can be replaced by pressing ctrl- key/alt-key on the keyboard. Preverably install a Logitech Mouse Driver V6.0 (Included in this release named MOUSE.COM). MS-DOS Oberon also supports a 2-button mouse. In this case, the left button subsumes the functions execute and set caret. To switch from execute to set caret, keep the mouse still and the button pressed for ca. 0.5 sec. Display MS-DOS Oberon by default assumes a VGA display interface with a resolution of 640 * 480 * 16. However, support is also provided for the ET4000 Super-VGA standard with a resolution of 1024 * 768 * 256. In order to activate the Super- VGA support, simply open ET4000.Tool, execute the renaming command and restart Oberon. Printing DOS-Oberon currently supports Postscript and HP PCL printing. To that purpose, different drivers are available: The HP500 printer family and Postscript. These drivers assume that an appropriate printer device is connected to one of the parallel ports LPT1 or LPT2 or the serial ports COM1 or COM2 with 9600 baud for Postscript printers and 19200 baud for HP printers. If no suitable printer is installed, a printfile (Document.Print) is generated on the local disk. Simply open Printer.Tool in Oberon, execute the renaming command and restart Oberon. System Installation and Operation The installation kit consists of the following files: name contents README.TXT this description SYSTEM.EXE Oberon system in compressed form (selfextracting file) CHANGES.TXT Changes since the last release to install Oberon 1) assert FILES = 64 in CONFIG.SYS 2) create new directory 3) copy SYSTEM.EXE into new directory 4) execute SYSTEM.EXE to load and start Oberon 5) install mouse driver 6) set directory containing the Oberon system to current directory 7) execute START command System Exit 8) Activate command System.Quit Getting started with Oberon The above mentioned book The Oberon System- User Guide and Programmer's Manual is a complete and comprehensive guide to the basic Oberon system. In addition, online documentation for the Gadgets system is included in the installation kit, as well as some sample source code files. See the different tools for prepared opening commands. List of installed Oberon packages Program packages Basic system Compiler Edit program editor Paint picture editor Script (V3) /Write (V2) text editor Illustrate (V3) /Draw (V2) graphic editor Gadgets (V3 only) Program samples in source form Biorhythm.Mod calculates biorythm RandomNumbers.Mod generates good random numbers IFS.Mod generates fractal fern graphic Online documentation ReadMe.Text this text OberonGuide.Text GadgetsGuide.Text Version 3 user's and programmer's guide Fonts Courier monospace font Syntax proportional text font Elektra general symbols Math mathematical symbols