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1994-07-02
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4KB
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74 lines
HYDRA protocol sample implementation, Amiga port rev.2 by
Olaf Barthel
Brabeckstrasse 35
D-30559 Hannover
eMail: olsen@sourcery.han.de
The Amiga support modules are freely distributable. For further information
on the remaining distribution refer to the files `hydra.asc' and
`hydra.doc'.
Many thanks to James McOrmond who supplied the HYDRA source code. This
program was compiled using the SAS/C compiler, it requires Kickstart 2.04
or higher to run.
*
What is HYDRA?
==============
HYDRA is a bidirectional file transfer protocol designed by Joaquim H.
Homrighausen and Arjen G. Lentz similar to Bimodem, a proprietary file
transfer protocol. It originated in the PC world and, as far as I know, has
been ported only to the Atari ST yet. This distribution adds an Amiga port.
The HYDRA protocol can send and receive data at the same time and also adds
a chat option.
What about the source code?
===========================
The source code included in this distribution was edited slightly to allow
the Amiga implementation to work properly. The original code was
busy-polling keyboard and serial line, a feature which needed to be
replaced by multitasking friendly code on the Amiga side. The Amiga port
tries to emulate the asynchronous serial I/O code the original PC version
of the HYDRA protocol sample implementation.
What about the documentation?
=============================
The file called `hydra.doc', to be found in the `source' directory
describes the HYDRA sample protocol implementation in detail. Refer to this
file for more information on the program.
Differences between the Amiga port and the original program
===========================================================
The original implementation did not support the "DEVICE" keyword which was
added to the Amiga port in order to allow third party serial device drivers
to be used. The split-screen technique used by the original implementation
was replaced by multiple console windows. Pull-down menus partly replace
the odd keyboard commands supported by the original implementation, i.e.
some keyboard commands work, some don't. There is no Fossil support in this
implementation ;-) All the features of the original implementation should
work, although some may not make much sense on the Amiga. There is no
separate HydraCfg program.
Where I needed to make changes to the source code my tag "/* OLSEN */"
indicates where to look for changes.
What's different in revision 2 of this port?
============================================
I had overlooked some MS-DOS dependancies in the source code, namely path
and file name lengths which used to be limited to 13 and 90 characters,
respectively. Where such restrictions were obvious they were removed.
HydraCom now offers an interface to the forthcoming new `term' release
and in fact any other terminal program that provides the same hooks as
`term'. If you give the name of the ARexx port `term' has open as the
device name (i.e. "device TERM") HydraCom will try to interface to `term'.
If successful, HydraCom will take over serial device processing, blocking
`term' access to the serial driver. When HydraCom is in possession of the
serial driver you may transfer files as usual, but remember that `term'
itself will be disabled while HydraCom is running. When finished, quit
HydraCom, this will return control back to `term'.