UKNC software (1)
=================

I have  played with my  brand new  PDP-11 workstation (with  the Soviet
UKNC computer) a  bit. There is a huge software  archive available [1].
It's a collection  of floppy disk images of various  quality so one has
to try them to see if they work and how well.

At the  moment I have  made the  NC file manager  working. It is  a two
panel thing (unlike the default Northon Commander setup this thing has
vertical location of  panels - one is  on the top and the  second is on
the bottom). IT works but it is a bit unstable, There are several other
versions of the NC so I should try them all and to select the best one.

Note to self: SET NC ON is required to start the NC.SYS file.

The RT-11 OS has some features which  I am not accustomed to. So the NC
is a great help after all.

The second thing is the Turbo BASIC IDE. It can run BASIC stuff but the
version bundled with the NC saves  some mess which prevents it from use
of saved files.

There is also the C compiler. I just verified that I can see the floppy
and to  start the  CC but did  a little  after that. I  need to  find a
working text  editor first (the  UKNC floppies are  not huge -  it uses
800kB ones) so  many RT-11 parts are usually removed  to find space for
games :-(.

It seems that I will have to  prepare mu own boot disk with a different
selection of software  (no game but with a file  manage and an editor).
But I should read more about startup and command files here.

It I  have not  mentioned that: the  UKNC has the  8 MHz  PDP-11ish CPU
which is not slow.  With the NC and the Turbo BASIC if  feels like a PC
of late 1980s or early 1990s. The  main limit is the 64 kB build-in RAM
(it is said that  just some 56 kB are available to  user). Still a much
more than my  Bk-0010.1 (a home PDP-11 computer) or  the MK-90 portable
(a PDP-11 one, too!) has... And if feels to be way faster than my Apple
IIe (I  know that it  is unfair as  the poor IIe as  just an 1  MHz MOS
CPU).

P.S. One day I  will made some pictures of the device.  But it is quite
boring: a gray computer-in-keyboard one.


References:

[1] http://archive.pdp-11.org.ru/ukdwk_archive/ukncbtlwebcomplekt/

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