Article 7422 of comp.sys.amiga: Path: xanth!mcnc!rutgers!ucla-cs!zen!ucbvax!COGSCI.BERKELEY.EDU!bryce From: bryce@COGSCI.BERKELEY.EDU (Bryce Nesbitt) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: A glossary of Amiga specific terms Summary: Clip & save. Show to your local neophyte. Keywords: glossary, terms, terminology, help Message-ID: <8707300159.AA12107@cogsci.berkeley.edu> Date: 30 Jul 87 01:59:17 GMT Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: Institute of Cognitive Studies, UC Berkeley Lines: 331 --------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- An Amiga glossary. Terms and definitions often used when discussing ----- the Amiga. Copyright (C)1987 Bryce Nesbitt. All rights reserved. ----- Please don't redistribute as of yet. Please write to me if you have ----- gripes at a definition, or if you feel something should be added. ------ucbvax!cogsci!bryce -or- bryce@cogsci.Berkeley.EDU --------------------------------------------------------------------------- :-) A net smilely. When sprinkled near a statement it indicates that it was was not meant seriously. "The bombs drop in 5 minutes" -Ronald Reagan :-) () Used to signify a routine. If I talk about Wait(), I am referring to the routine named "Wait". $C00000 MEMORY Memory that sits at location $C00000. Such memory is automatically added to the memory lists by the V1.2 operating system, yet does not take up normal auto-config space. AGNUS One of the "big three" custom chips inside the Amiga. Controls RAM addressing, DMA and other timing. AmigaDOS Amiga Disk Operating System. Strictly speaking, the part of the Amiga operating system that controls the file system. Unlike MS-DOS, there is more to the Amiga operating system that just DOS. Workbench CLI Programs \ | / \ | / \ | / \ | / \ | / AmigaDOS ;DOS level / | \ RAM: DF0: HD0: ;FILE SYSTEM level | | | ;(managed by handler processes) memory disk hard disk ;DEVICE level drive drive ;(managed by device drivers) Programs may often bypass the DOS level by sending a packet directly to the proper handler process. ARP AmigaDOS Replacement Project. A holy crusade undertaken by Charlie Heath (of Microsmiths) to implement and distribute a free set of improved CLI commands, and programmer facilities. ATOM A kludge to help developers tell their programs the differences between FAST and CHIP memory. See FIXHUNK. AUTO-CONFIG A system of automatically detecting and configuring memory and hardware without the need for millions of dip switches or direct user hassle. Basically, the software will tell the individual board's hardware what address ranges to respond to, and will resolve conflicts. Not actually implemented in the Amiga until operating system V1.2. AUTODOC A brief, sometimes cryptic, summary of each Amiga library routine is kept in the actual original source code. These are extracted automatically by C-A and distributed on paper (in the RKM) or on disk to programmers. BOOT From "to pull oneself up by one's bootstraps". To start or restart one's computer from scratch. With the exception of recoverable RAM disks, this means loosing all data in memory. BARREL SHIFTER The part of the blitter that can shift bit images to arbitrary boundaries nearly instantly. BIMMER BLITTER A graphics engine that is part of the custom chips. It can do BLITs (Block Image Transfers) in hardware. Sometimes called a BIMMER (Bitmap IMmage Manipulator) because it can also do logic operations during the transfer, line draws, hardware fills, and more. C-A Shorthand for Commodore-Amiga, Inc. CHIP MEMORY Memory accessible by the custom chips. This contains the frame buffer, sprites, audio DMA buffers, etc. This memory runs at twice the speed of the 68000, which normally allows the 68000 to run without delay. With a very busy display that has lots of extra colors, copper lists, or blitter moves, this memory can get bogged down with all the extra work. Fortunately there is an alternative, it's called FAST MEMORY. CHUNK See IFF. CLI The AmigaDOS Command Line Interpreter. A traditional line oriented DOS interface. Can be though of as existing "under" the Workbench Tool. COPPER Display co-processor. Yet another microprocessor within the Amiga, this time specialized at for raster synchronization. It only has three instructions, but since it can access any of the ~100 custom chip registers it's rather powerful. Easy tricks include changing resolution on any line, reusing sprites later in a display, modifying the pallette on the fly, page flipping with no 68000 involvement, etc. DEAMON The actual working part of a program that may do it's dirty work while hidden in the background. DENISE One of the "big three" custom chips in the Amiga. Contains the video output signals, mouse input and misc. timing. DEVICE, EXEC Usually a task that that talks directly to some piece of hardware. The "keyboard.device", for example, reads the keyboard then tells the rest of the world about it. The "trackdisk.device" is an example of a device that can have multiple units. Programs communicate to devices with IO requests, a form of inter-task communication. The standard devices are: timer, trackdisk, keyboard, gameport, input, console, audio, narrator, serial, parallel, and printer. With each hard drive, SCSI interface, or extra serial port, you will probably get another exec device. DEVICE DRIVER The actual code that a device executes. EHB Extra HalfBrite. A video mode that allows 64 colors per line. Available on all A500s and A2000s, and roughly half of the A1000s. EXEC The executive. Master of the Amiga. Controls task switching and low level system details. EXECUTE To command a program or sequence of computer instructions to commence. Not "put to death". FAST MEMORY Memory that is not accessible to the custom chips, and not subject to possible delay, either. Most quality expansion memory fits in this category. This is the preferred location for most program code and data. FILE SYSTEM A place to store files. DF0: is one, so is RAM:. FIXHUNK A utility. Some older programs for the Amiga where improperly written and will not work if non-CHIP memory is added. Fixhunk can usually fix the problem. GARY Stands for "Gate ARaY", cute eh? A single custom chip used in the Amiga 500 that replaces a large number of individual chips from the original A1000. GENLOCK The capability that allows synchronizing of the Amiga's video to an external source and the overlay of the two images. GOLDFISH A intellectual possession of another that is not to be abused, stepped on, fried or otherwise compromised. :-) HAM Hold And Modify. A obscure, but powerful, Amiga video mode that expresses each pixel as a modification of the last. Allows for some nice shading. HANDLER On the Amiga, the code that manages a file system. Handlers often live in the L: directory when not in use. HEAP A place to toss all sorts of junk. HUNK A subdivision of an AmigaDOS object file. HUNKS come in several flavors including those that store CODE, DATA and BSS (uninitialized data). If all the HUNKS in a file do not line up correctly, AmigaDOS will report error 121, "file not an object module". HUNKPAD A utility that can fix files that have been damaged by XMODEM transfer. One symptom of a damaged file is error 121, "file is not an object module". This utility also prevents future XMODEM damage. HYBRID MEMORY Memory that can't be addressed by the custom chips, yet is still subject to the delays they can can cause. Sometimes called SLOW FAST memory. ICON A pictorial representation of a file. Expressed as a file with the ".info" suffix. These come in the DISK, DRAWER, TOOL, PROJECT, GARBAGE, DEVICE and KICK flavors. The last is not used, and the second to last is used in conjunction with auto-config. IFF Interchange File Format. A standard for creating file format standards. Popular formats include ILBM (InterLeaved Bit-Map) for raster images, SVX8 (8 bit digital samples), and SMUS (Simple MUsical Score). ILBM, SVX8 and SMUS are all FORMs. Each form is composed of one or more CHUNKS. Each CHUNK holds a specific class of the file's data. For example in ILBM FORMs there are several possible CHUNKs including BHMD which holds the actual picture data, CMAP which holds the color map, and DEST which has to do with converting pictures with different depths. Any writer that does not know about DEST won't write that. Any reader that does not care about DEST won't read it. If a program wants a CMAP, but a file does not have it, it will use default values or make something up. The beauty of this system is that new CHUNKS can be be added to an existing IFF file definition without affecting portability. INPUT.DEVICE Where all the input from the keyboard, mouse and other user input devices flows. Also a popular place for user interface modifying programs to hang out. INTUITION "The Amiga user interface". Intuition uses the low level layers and graphics libraries to build screens, windows, menus, gadgets and other user interaction mechanisms. LIBRARY All Amiga system function calls are grouped into libraries. Commonly used libraries include exec, intuition, dos and graphics. LOCK An AmigaDOS structure that prevents multitasking programs from stomping on shared files. Other Amiga subsystems use locks for other purposes. MMU A device for arbitrating and protecting against a task damaging the memory of another task. Also has lots of other uses that are beyond the scope of this discussion. The current generation Amigas do not contain one. MESSAGE A mechanism of inter-task communication. NUKE To destroy, demolish, obliterate, wipe out, mung, hash into little bits, waste, screw up, or make FUBAR, by means of atomic weapons, or with a computer. OVERLAY An AmigaDOS feature that allows part of a program to sit on disk, to be brought into memory only when needed. OVERSCAN Any of the pixels beyond 640 (high res) or 320 (lo res) wide and 200 or 400 high that are actually used in a display. The Amiga system software will let you specify a display as wide as 704, and as high as 464 pixels, but on most monitors some of that will be clipped by the borders of the display monitor used. It is possible to adjust a monitor to show that space, however. The "morerows" program can be used to add overscan pixels to the Workbench screen. For broadcast TV use, overscan allows the picture to use the full width of the display. PACKET, AmigaDOS An AmigaDOS specific message. All DOS activity is actually carried out with a packet sent to the proper DOS HANDLER process. PAULA Another of the "big three" custom chips. Includes the audio DAC's, 4703 custom interrupt chip, custom serial chip, and hyper-fancy custom disk controller. PROCESS A task that has been taught how to talk to AmigaDOS. PROJECT Workbenchism for the output of a tool. A data file. RKM The ROM Kernal Manual, the Amiga programmer's bible. The other two essential books are the Intuition manual and the AmigaDOS manual(s). These books are *not* tutorial in nature. PUBLIC A memory attribute that must be specified if a section of memory is to be shared between two processes. This will become critical when a MMU is added to the Amiga. TASK The system's idea of a running program. Each task thinks that it has the main processor all to itself. Each task is wrong. It will actually be sharing it with many other tasks. Tasks that have nothing to do will Wait(). Waiting tasks take virtually no processor time. TOOL Workbenchism for "program" UUDECODE UUENCODE Encode and decode routines that allow the transmission of binary files over normal text based mail systems. VULCAN NERVE PINCH The CTRL-AMIGA-AMIGA reboot sequence. WCS Writable Control Store. This is the 256K of extra memory on the Amiga 1000 that is provided to hold the contents of the Kickstart disk. The V1.1 and V1.2 operating system updates where distributed on disk. WORKBENCH SCREEN The default screen that appears when the machine first starts up. It's titled "Workbench Screen" and may, or may not, contain the workbench tool. WORKBENCH TOOL The icon oriented interface to AmigaDOS. This is normally started up when the machine is booted via the "LoadWB" command. "LoadWB -debug" can be used to start up with an invisible debug menu. ----------------------------- |\ /| . Ack! (NAK, EOT, SOH) {o O} . ( " ) bryce@cogsci.berkeley.EDU -or- ucbvax!cogsci!bryce U "Success leads to stagnation; stagnation leads to failure."