\documentstyle[a4,12pt]{article} \begin{document} \author{John Butler} \title{A Brief Introduction to the APM system} \maketitle \parskip .1in \noindent The Department has an ethernet-like local area network with about 60 Advanced Personal Machines (APM's) and a number of file-servers attached. There are three principal public file servers, referred to as ALPHA, BRAVO and CHARLIE ,and special ones DEMO and MET. Users are normally accredited to only one of these, and any of the workstations can be used with any of them. \begin{description} \item[ALPHA] This is still under development. \item[BRAVO] This is normally used by the staff and postgraduate students \item[CHARLIE] This is normally used by undergraduates and MSc students \item[DEMO] This is a demonstration and project machine \item[MET] This belongs to the Department of Meteorology. \end{description} The workstations are modular computer systems based at present on the Motorola 68000. There are many different hardware configurations possible, and some of these are described below. Most software will run on any of the systems unless it has any specific hardware requirements (eg. Graphics). \begin{description} \item[Basic system] Motorola 68000 or 68010, 2Mb of memory, Ethernet interface, Wyse 75 or (occasionally) Visual 200 VDU. \item[Level 1.5 graphics] Basic system, 8 plane framestore, mouse interface, Colour monitor. \item[Big system] Basic system but up to 7.5 Mb of main memory. There are a couple of these in the public area. \item[6809 system] Basic system with an additional Motorola 6809 subsystem. The 6809 is a self-contained small machine used for assembler teaching and Real-Time control. \item[Gandalf system] There is a rack of 6 APMs attached to the Gandalf. These may be called remotely by responding ``APM'' to the Gandalf ``Service?'' prompt. \end{description} If users require other configurations they should ask the technical staff for assistance. All of the public workstations are currently situated in the machine halls bar one which is in the project lab. Six APMs are on the Gandalf PACX and are accessible from any Gandalf terminal (and indeed from anywhere else via the network). \subsection*{Powering on} \subsubsection*{If switched off} Switch on the VDU (switch on the right hand side or front), and colour monitor (switch below the screen at the front) if one is present. Turn the key switch on the front right of the APM cabinet. The machine will now boot from the default filestore. (BRAVO for machines in offices and CHARLIE for most public machines) As the machine boots various messages giving the versions of the system components and files being loaded are printed on the console. The machines should be left switched on during the day. \subsubsection*{Reinitialising a stuck system} If you wish to re-boot the system while it is running, you can press Ctrl+T, followed by 'R' for Re-boot. If the terminal does not respond, the machine can be re-booted by pressing the reset switch on the processor board (the one with two lights and a ribbon cable) which is inside the cabinet. \subsection*{Logging on} When the machine finishes booting the cursor should be positioned to the right of a curly bracket, which is the command prompt ('\}'). The form of the login command is \begin{tabbing} xxxx\=xxxxxxxxxxxxxx\=xxxxxxxxxx\=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx\kill \> L Username \> or \> L Filestore::Username \\ \> password \> \> password \\ \end{tabbing} If the form on the left is used, the system will attempt to log you onto the same filestore as was used by the previous person (or the one it booted from if it has just been booted). If the message 'No Authority' appears you have mis-typed the username or password. If the message 'Owner XXX: not found' occurs then you may be trying to use the wrong filestore, and the form on the right should be used. Once you have logged on successfully, any system alert messages are printed, and your file LOGIN.COM, if you have one, will be obeyed. \subsection*{On your first log on} Users are normally accredited with a null password. If the user FG has just been accredited to filestore 'C', the following is a typical dialogue required to `personalise' their number. \begin{tabbing} xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx\=xxxxxxxxxx\=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx\kill \} L c::fg \\ Pass: \> \{ Press $<$return$>$ \\ You are using Filestore C (1B) \> \{ Welcome message and alert info. \\ \} PASS \> \{ Call password-setting utility \\ Current password: \> \{ Press $<$return$>$ \\ New password: DALE \> \{ Note password ``DALE'' is not echoed \\ Confirm: DALE \> \{ You must type it correctly again or \\ \> \{it will not be changed. \\ \} v :n/login.com \> \{ create a login.com file using VECCE editor \\ $>>$ g0 \> \{ Lines typed in now go into the file. \\ \> \{ SETUP EDWIN if using graphics \footnote{See caveats re more than one SETUP in a .COM file - HELP SETUP} \\ \> \{ SETUP VLSI if using VLSI software \\ \> \{ SETUP ML if using ML \\ $>>$: \> \{ to finish entering text \\ $>>$ \%c \> \{ to close edit \\ \end{tabbing} \subsection*{Logging off} The L command always logs you off before logging you on. If you just want to log off, the L command without a username parameter should be used. This command will cause a Gandalf APM to reboot unless a username is supplied. \subsection*{Contacts} If a query cannot be solved by using the information provided by the command HELP or if you have queries relating to filestore administration (new accounts, quotas, forgotten passwords etc) then users should contact the departmental advisory service (if this is in operation) or the computing support officers Linda Hamilton (LINDA on ECSVAX). in room 2416 or Carol Anstruther (CAROL) who has an office in the South machine hall. If the query is non-urgent then users are asked to use the VAX/VMS mail system. \subsection*{Commands} The general form of a command is VERB inputs / outputs -qualifier1 -q2 -q3 The general form of a file name is FILESTORE::USER:FILENAME however you can only access files on the particular filestore you logged on to and the filestore field of the name must be omitted. An exception to this is the EFTP program which can be used to transfer files between filestores, HELP EFTP gives further details. Filenames consist of 12 characters in the range 'a' to 'z', '0' to '9', '.', '\$', '\_' in any order. Upper and lower case letters are treated as equivalent. If the filename starts with a dollar, the file is assumed to be a temporary file, and is deleted when the user logs off. Although the filestore has no concept of file extensions, the system uses the convention that files ending in .COM are command files, and files ending in .MOB are Motorola Object files, and files ending in .LIS are listing files. Users often find it convenient to treat the last 4 characters of the name as an extension, which allows programs to run on both the VMS and APM systems with no changes. There are two special characters ``!'' and ``?'' which may appear on the end of a filename. These indicate temporary and corrupt files respectively. Corrupt files indicate a filestore inconsistency and should be reported. Most commands will prompt for their parameters if these are omitted, and will give the user further options if the command line ends with a question mark. This is a very brief summary of some of the standard commands. Further information on these (and other) commands can be found by giving the command HELP, which allows the user to explore a tree-structured database of help information. Users are recommended to start with HELP APM and HELP UTILITIES. If you are moving files around or are printing to remote printers then you should look at HELP FILETRANSFER as well. If you are considering a hardware project, HELP HARDWARE contains most of what you require. John Butler has the ``definitive'' document set in hard copy. \begin{tabbing} xxxxxxxxxxxx\=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx\=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx\=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx\=\kill ANALYSE \> file \> Analyse the file specified \\ ASS \> file \> Assemble a 68000 program \\ CC \> file \> C compiler (HELP C for details) \\ COMPARE \> file1, file2 / output \> Compare text files \\ COPY \> input / output \> Copy input to output \\ DELETE \> filelist \> Delete files specifed \\ DUMP \> file \> Dump the contents of the file (hex) \\ EFTP \> \> Move files between filestores \\ F or FILES \> user \> List the files owned by user \\ HELP \> topic \> Help about commands, packages etc. \\ UE \> file \> Use the MicroEmacs screen editor \\ IMP \> file \> Compile an IMP program \\ INSTALL \> objectfilelist \> Make externals available for linking \\ P \> file \> Print a file or files \\ PASS \> \> Set users password \\ PASCAL \> file \> Compile a Pascal program \\ PERMIT \> file / permission \> Set permission on files \\ RENAME \> old / new \> Rename a file \\ SET \> owner \> Set to owner directory (cf. BECOME) \\ SHOWSYM \> symbol \> See if the symbol is defined \\ T \> input / output \> Create, Copy, Type files \\ TO \> file \> Redirect output to file \\ USERS \> \> List the users logged onto filestore \\ UTILITIES \> \> HELP UTILITIES for more commands \\ V \> file / file \> Use the Visual ECCE editor \\ VAX \> \> Log onto the VAX (if essential!) \end{tabbing} \subsection*{Systems} The APM operating system is a single process system which was designed in the early days of the APM to get the machines working and though adequate for most uses is not intended to compete with operating systems such as Unix. Its main benefits are that it is simple, efficient and allows direct access to the hardware. The MUSS operating system is running on one machine and the multiprocess MOUSE operating system runs on some servers. This document is accessible as HELP INTRO on the APMs \end{document}