Hello, Thanks, and lazy Questions.

TL;DR
Thanks for porting it to the pi400, never heard of Acorn/Risc OS until I saw it on the Raspberry pi Imager App
(I’ve googled a bit, and read some of the Risc OS user guide ), but hey, lazyweb.. :)
I’m fairly tech-literate
The SDCard from the store, I wish that all the 3rd party commercial software was pre-installed. Readme’s aside I’m not sure how to “install” software.. I get the Apps are sort of folders you can just drag to wherever you want.. but the filer needs to see it’.. to register the filetypes.
and I see the Packman, though my pi400 has no internet, can I use it too install the other stuff on the SDcard?

IHNBTD
(your time is infinite.. keep reading..: )

I’ve been playing with Risc OS for a couple of weeks on my pi400. I opted for the ePic/Nutpi sd card, because the RiscOS Direct(?) image had an “out of memory error”, and I collapsed into a fetal position having flashbacks to ..EDIT CONFIG.SYS
I like it quite a lot – fast, consistent UI & keyboard shortcuts.. the Adjust button is really nice, *IT DOESN’T HAVE A >FLAT< UI. UI. not UX.. *
I’m using it as a private and distraction free (no wifi!, giant BLOB running on the GPU aside) journal in StrongEd..

Mo’ Questions:

0. Is there a way to change the shortcut keys -copy/paste/search/etc. to the IBM CUA/MACWINdows command/ctrl-v/x/c ?
1.
The relationship with Cloverleaf & RiscOS Developments and RiscOpen.. is this a delicate topic?
I belive one has a new TCP/IP stack from FreeBSD, and the other from OpenBSD?

2.
Running on this 16GB SD-CaRd the ePic pi/nutPi, is saving /wearing going to be an issue ? (Does ADFS on a “big” drive use large “cluster (in DOS/FAT terms) sizes”?

3. what are the limits of max volume size/number of files/filename length ? I checked wikipedia, but .. i’m still not quite sure.. I assume that this SDcard is ADFS.

4.
In terms of RiscOS could somebody give me an analogy of volumes/partions,/BSD Slices, and the relationship between
ADFS & FileCORE, or reading a FAT32 drive?

Thanks

watch these youtube videos before starting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=botfr2a-1kY

Let try to sort problems one at a time, you say that you have no internet, have you connected an
RJ45 network cable to your Pi400 as there is no WiFi currently available on RISC OS.
If you do not have access to wired internet you can use a Mobile internet stick LTE Huawei e3372.
Some Pi400 have a different Ethernet chip that will not work with the current network stack on RISC OS. I hope yours is not one of them. there are also USB Ethernet adapters that you can use if this is the case search on the this forum to get the correct on.
To answer Question 2 I would reconsider installing RISC OS Direct for Here https://www.riscosdev.com/projects/ you can also download the new internet stack and Pinboard 2,
Download them on a PC or Mac copy the compressed zip files onto a USB Stick formatted to Fat16 RISC OS will be Able to read the files then drag them on to you SD card before you try to unpack them.
Don’t worry about the SDCard for now as you can always just use the SDCard like UBoot and Put RISC OS on to an external USB SSD to get faster access or not use a SDCard at all and boot directly from USB SSD this is a bit technical as you have to have a special Folder inside your !Boot called Loader this is a small Fat partition with the RISC OS ROM and support files.

Any way this should be a starting point let us know how you get on with these tips.
watch these youtube videos before starting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=botfr2a-1kY

Apps are sort of folders you can just drag to wherever you want.. but the filer needs to see it’.. to register the filetypes.

You need to “Look at” them during booting. Menu (middle button on mouse) over the Task Manager icon (far right of iconbar), and select Configure… Then click on Boot, then Look At, then drag the applications from their installed location into the list. Click on Set and then Set to close the configure dialogues, and you’re done.

If you start to use an application launcher (eg. Pinboard 2 or Launcher – but I’m biased, and there are plenty of other options out there), this will probably do the same thing for you.

Is there a way to change the shortcut keys -copy/paste/search/etc. to the IBM CUA/MACWINdows command/ctrl-v/x/c ?

They are already Ctrl-V, Ctrl-C, Ctrl-X. If specific applications aren’t, there may be fixes – these will be application-specific, though (eg. you can reconfigure StrongED’s key bindings).

I see the Packman, though my pi400 has no internet, can I use it too install the other stuff on the SDcard

If you’re talking about the commercial stuff, then no: Packman, by it’s nature, is generally free stuff.

whats happened to systemdisc the domain is parked?

whats happened to systemdisc the domain is parked?

It’s distributed by Elesar; the same is true for CloneDisc.

It’s distributed by Elesar; the same is true for CloneDisc.

A question on this, however, having looked at the website. I see there are newer versions of both tools listed, compared to the ones that I have. Is there an upgrade path for Piccolo customers, or is it a case of buying the apps again from Elesar?

Is there an upgrade path for Piccolo customers, or is it a case of buying the apps again from Elesar?

I seem to remember that when I had an issue with one of the programs that it was a case of contacting Elesar who checked with Piccolo and then you got the newer version download link by Elesar.

Is there a way to change the shortcut keys -copy/paste/search/etc. to the IBM CUA/MACWINdows command/ctrl-v/x/c ?
They are already Ctrl-V, Ctrl-C, Ctrl-X.

Some of the built-in applications (like Paint, Draw, Edit) pre-date the industry standard, and use those keys slightly differently. For example you may find Control-C copies within the document (like copy and paste together) , rather than to a clipboard, and ctrl-V might move within the document (like cut and paste together).

Some of those application used to use ctrl-C to copy within, and have changed in more recent versions to use ctrl-D for that (duplicate). However the clipboard in RISC OS is a relatively recent addition (i.e. within the last 10 years) so not everything knows about it.

your time is infinite..

I wish…

The relationship with Cloverleaf & RiscOS Developments and RiscOpen..

ROOL (here) are the gatekeepers. They make the source available, the build system for new releases, and so forth. See the News tab for info on what they do.

RODev owns the rights, which is to say they are the actual legal owners of the operating system. Thanks to a need by a commercial customer, they have a functioning updated IPv6 capable network stack. They have also ported a WebKit browser to RISC OS, which is so far in advance of anything else we have that it isn’t funny. Google Docs runs like treacle (the fault of RISC OS, only uses one core) but it works. FlightRadar24 plots and animates little aircraft in real time over a map. I honestly never thought I’d see such a thing, but it’s come to pass.

Cloverleaf… is/was/might be an attempt to get stuff moving by crowd funding things. It’s gone a bit quiet so…

is this a delicate topic?

I would imagine the two different network stacks issue is and always will be a bit of a tricky subject. Personally I’d be happy to bung the RODev one into ROM and call it done (granted I haven’t tried IPv6 yet, but the IPv4 side just quietly does its thing on my system).

is saving /wearing going to be an issue ?

Technically, yes.
On the other hand, an SD card will manage it’s own wear levelling. It will be a bit suboptimal as the disc fills up given that RISC OS doesn’t support TRIM (tells the SD controller when blocks are no longer in use), however my µSD card has been in my machine for years.
Granted, it could fail at any moment, but then so could spinning rust.
The golden rules are the same as always – perform regular backups, and don’t buy cheap media (and never anything from Amazon/eBay/Alibaba…).

what are the limits of max volume size/number of files/filename length ?

Maximum volume size is big. Not sure offhand, but people have SSDs with a few hundred gigabytes.

Personally I wouldn’t use a drive of more than 16-32GB. RISC OS apps are small so you don’t tend to need oodles of space like on a PC. My primary media is only 8GB, with a USB stick (16GB) for drag-drop backups and periodically tidying up the accumulated rubbish that the internet provides. ;)

The reason for the smaller size is too permit a reasonable timespan when removing the SD card and making a full image of it on my PC. So I have two types of backup, files get copied across to the USB key, and every so often I do a low level image of the complete card.

The maximum number of files and maximum filename length are opaque values. The “official” response is “you don’t need to know”. This might sound a bit arse backwards, but unfortunately older versions of RISC OS had a “limit” of ten character filenames and 77 files per directory, and some people took this as the gospel truth and coded to it, even though it wasn’t actually correct even back then (FAT, for instance, is eight plus three plus a slash…which is 12; and I think original CDFS could have 31 character file names; both could exceed the 77 file limit).

In reality, however, the full name of a file (path and name) cannot exceed about 230 characters. This is because in the desktop, filenames are frequently passed using Wimp messages, which are 256 bytes and 20 or so are header values.
You can easily exceed this, but expect things to go wrong in the desktop if you do.

Is there a way to change the shortcut keys

Some applications do, others don’t, some can be changed (like StrongEd). The reason for this is because traditionally RISC OS used a different set of default actions (and had no clipboard).
The base UI predates modern Mac, Linux, Windows 3… so back then the most standardised keypresses were “whatever WordStar or WordPerfect used”. Both command line full screen programs. ;)

I assume that this SDcard is ADFS.

No, it’s SDFS.

and the relationship between
ADFS & FileCORE

FileCore handles the core part of the RISC OS specific filesystem, clue in the name. ;)

There are actually four parts to the setup.

Firstly we have ADFSFiler, SDFSFiler, etc etc. These are basically that which you see on the screen when you click on a media icon to see the files inside. If I remember correctly, they’re all built from the same source with a few minor modifications as necessary.

FileSwitch is the next level down. This handles stuff like enumerating directories, opening and closing files, deleting files etc.

From here it splits in two. The first split is for FileCore (native RISC OS format) which handles the lower level things like maps and free space and where the data actually is.
Below FileCore are things like ADFS and SDFS that work with FileCore to make the filing system actually work and to talk to the hardware.

There’s a sort of grey area for stuff like NetFS, but you’re not going to run into Econet any time soon.

The other side of the split are what is known as image filing systems. These take “something” and act as a go between from whatever the “something” is to a RISC OS style filing system. An example is DOSFS that reads and writes FAT media. Another example is SparkFS that reads and writes zip files and the like.

One of the attributes if image filing systems is their root doesn’t need to be the media root. Therefore you can go into, say, $.Documents.Downloads and open up an archive called stuff/zip and this will appear as $.Documents.Downloads.stuff/zip, in other words just as it it were another directory within the filing system. Something, I note, that XP still makes a mess of (my PC runs XP, I’d hope more recent versions could manage to do what we could in 1992).

For FAT32 media, Fat32FS is an add-on you’ll want to install. DOSFS is older and more, shall we say, limited?

That being said, if your main computer can do SMB1 shares (the old insecure type, you might need to fiddle to find a way to turn this on), you can access shares from RISC OS.
My PC has a directory C:\xyzzy which is shared on the network as xyzzy, so if I want to transfer anything from the PC, I simply drop the file there and use LanMan to access it under RISC OS.

Maybe one day we’ll have the ability to toss files around using Bluetooth. That’s what I do with my PC/phones/tablet (but not the iPad for protectionist bulls**t reasons).
But for now, SMB sharing is a fairly quick way that doesn’t involve the hassles of plugging in stuff (not so easy when the Pi isn’t particularly accessible).

your time is infinite..

I wish…

The problem isn’t the absolute time available, it’s the time remaining after stuff.

the most standardised keypresses were “whatever WordStar or WordPerfect used”.

Wordstar sort of matched some other items partially, word perfect 6 didn’t match word perfect 5, the codes they used under the bonnet, er, nah.

Thanks for the responses.

I wonder what customer needs IPv6 & RiscOS?

Mo’ Questions.

So FileCore is sort of like the VFS layer, and then below are the various actual filesystems, and SparkFS or NetFS are sort of like FuSE filesystems in the linux world?

Also, it looks like Ruby isn’t available on Risc OS? I thought I saw an ancient 1.8 thing..

Cheers.

To belatedly answer Stu’s filing system question by making everything even more complicated…

RISC OS filing system APIs are SWIs, just like everything else. To load or save a chunk of memory, or delete a file on disc, one uses OS_File at the machine language level. However, that’s just the front door. OS_File is one of the many “vectored” SWIs, which means all kinds of things (modules) can register their interest in implementing some or all of that functionality, some or all of the time. e.g. on my machine right now:

*VECTORS FileV
Vector  Workspace  Address
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
&8:File
          1C30C5C  216F678  iSV_RISCOS4_patch+F4
                0  218B110  SaferOSFile+FC
                0  2238C3C  AutoPrefix+78
          21BDE44  3B5413C  DDEUtils+874
          210C554  383C1F8  FileSwitch+99A8
                0  3804850  OS+4850

So that’s a bunch of stuff that may implement your request to create a directory or change the filetype of a file.

In principle, and the way that filing systems were implemented on the BBC Micro in the 80s (and yes, this does all date back that far), any filing system could be implemented by claiming FileV (and a bunch of other vectors) and hey presto, you now have a filing system for your FooBar gizmo. But that’s a lot of work, so we don’t do that.

Instead, there’s a standard implementation down there called FileSwitch, which does most of the work of switching between filing systems (hence the name), and does a lot of standardised stuff like filename groking. Filing systems register with FileSwitch. But FileSwitch only handles the filename stuff – what would be called the “file system” elsewhere. It does not concern itself with the nasty implementation details such as what bits you put where and quite how you talk to your device… that’s what the underling Filing System implementation does. And there have been something like 100 of them.

Some of these filing systems are virtual – such as vdu:, kbd: and printer: – which do exactly what you’d think. Some are concerned with specific media formats such as MacFS: and CDFS:, and some are more focused on the medium, such as LanMan98 or Fax.

Usually the format and the medium are one and the same, but certainly the native RISC OS disc formats are very widely used, so to avoid code duplication again the work of handling the native format is performed by FileCore (a client of FileSwitch), which deals with the “which bits go where” part, but not the talking-to-the-device part. So there are ‘filing systems’ like ADFS and RAMFS which are actually clients of FileCore and so only have to deal with hardware, and not what to put on it (they would be called block drivers elsewhere).

One of the best parts of the RISC OS filing system experience is implemented by FileSwitch, and that is the concept of “Image Filing Systems”. This allows any file on any filing system to be treated as an FS image of some other filing system. This allows you to have a FAT hard disc image on your FileCore-administered SDFS disc and access it as though it’s just a simple directory. This also allows you to navigate inside a ZIP file at the command line and create and delete files inside there which is something that Windows still can’t do, however much fakery it throws at its zip handling.

[And to add a paradoxically self-referential spin to this capability, there is a product called ‘ImageFS’ which makes various bitimage formats behave as image files and appear to be a directory containing a native bitimage – a Sprite – allowing programs that don’t understand TIFF, for example, to nevertheless load a TIFF without even noticing they’re doing so, and yes, write it back too. Very clever.]

There have been filing systems for FTP, video digitisers, countless foreign disc formats, compressed formats, packaging, pipes, translation, and even audio drivers. And thanks to the vectors/FileSwitch/FS abstraction, they all appear to work exactly the same, even at the command line.

Bet you’re sorry you asked.

nemo: not sorry I asked. Thanks for the detailed reply. !

Also:I remember the term “netiquette”.. so are ‘thank you’ reply messages wanted or just annoying?

Generally appreciated, if only to clear the nagging thought that the given answer could have been improved.