🚀 go-pugleaf

"Rod Speed" <rod_speed@yahoo.com> wrote:

>
>Fritz Oppliger <fritzo_two_@direcway.com> wrote
>
>> What is the magic needed to make qbasic
>> talk to the parallel port on WinXP  ?
>
>http://www.lvr.com/parport.htm
>
>> (how did Microsoft manage to break THAT?)
>
>By not allowing apps to do anything they like to the hardware directly.
>
>What any solid OS does.

Uhh, make that any solid _multi-tasking_ OS.  The requirement isn't there in
simple dos sytems and embedded controllers.  The real issue is more one of
changing standards than direct control.  MS _could_ have included ways for
transparent control through the OS that still protected the OS, but it was
simpler, cheaper, and in their financial best interest not to do so.  MS has
been trying to kill off DOS apps and force users into MS apps or Visual Studio
designed apps for years.

Some of the changes of standards are subtle and I wonder if they are designed
to trip up older programs.  Killing off support for LPRINT was an obvious way
that basic programs were affected in the port over to NTVDM, but I've also
found that copying a file to the parallel port using the copy command can be a
problem as well.  In the past, I've been able to print null strings to send a
LF CR to printers.  Now, I find that unless there is another character (such as
a space) seperating each instance of LF CR, XP will sometimes (but not always)
return a device fault error.  I submit that this is either intentional to
encourage use of the print manager or an error in the OS that is unprofessional
and unworthy of any OS.  I won't even go into the issues that can occur when
running a DOS based app in full screen mode instead of windowed mode.

One of the most powerful aspects of DOS was that each instruction was minimally
affected by a blanketing layer of OS code that was subject to capricious
change.  When the OS operates as a middle manager between the low level
commands and programs, any program becomes subject to OS management errors as
well as any shortcomings of its own.   MS banks on this.