Date : Tue, 11 Jul 2006 15:53:38 +0100
From : "Ian Wolstenholme" <BBCMailingList@...>
Subject: Re: Econet Socket Boxes
Just a general word about getting going in Econet. As a sweeping
generalisation (and I expect the purists will try to string me up!) if
all you want is a three or four station Econet for a bit of fun then
any old lash-up will do!
I started my very first Econet before I had any leads or DIN plugs
so I cut the cable off an old mouse and stripped the ends down and
soldered 1-inch lengths of paperclip (I've still got the scar on my
finger from when the scissors slipped cutting up the paperclips...) to
the ends of the wires and then pushed them in the DIN socket at
the back of the Beeb.
And it worked!
Econet came out long before Econet socket boxes. First there were
T-pieces but before that you had a length of cable with a terminator
at each end and you just cut a hole in the cable where you wanted
a station and soldered a lead to it with a DIN socket at the other end.
You can even run a short network without terminators and come to
think of it, you don't actually need a file server! The server is there
really only for STORAGE.
Granted, storage is a very important part of Econet but the server
is not needed for network operations involving communication between
two stations, like NOTIFY and REMOTE. You had to be logged on
to the server only to load the little bit of code into memory, after
that the server has no involvement in NOTIFY or REMOTE. In fact,
a NOTIFY is simply a case of performing an OSWORD call!
You can easily set up a two-station transmit/receive protocol
using the NFS/ANFS OSWORD & OSBYTE calls without the involvement
of a file server, similarly the network poke, peek, & JSR calls can
be used in this way.
In short, anything goes in Econet and it's great fun to play about with!
Naturally [he said, immediately anticipating the formation of
EconetLawyers4You and lots of county court claims...] it's preferable
to use the official gear, especially if the reliable storage and
retrieval of important data is required, but I hope people won't
write off getting into Econet solely for the lack of component X or
thingummy Y!
Best wishes,
Ian
----- Original Message -----
From: Joel Rowbottom
To: bbc-micro@...
Sent: Tue, 11 Jul 2006 14:42:27 +0100
Subject: [BBC-Micro] Econet Socket Boxes
Hi chaps --
Does anyone have a circuit diagram of the Econet dual DIN socket
boxes please? Were there any components inside these, or simply two
sockets connected to the Econet cable?
Found everything else except those :S
Ta
jx
--
Joel Rowbottom, was-kid, geek, coder, bad penny, 'Net addict since 1991
Personal: http://www.joel.co.uk | Pics: http://photos.jml.net