Issues With Side3 Standalone ATR Disk Swapping By Assigning Disk Drives To ATR Files Using Map Files

[bytebinge]

I have been trying to figure out how to play a game like "Ultima" with the Side3 where the game asks to swap the disk (in this case to a character disk). I watched the FlashJazzCat videos and I see where he loads a ".map" file so the two ATR files are assigned a disk drive number. Okay... Then you can use the button on the Side3 to swap between the two drives. Okay... I look in the manual for the Side3 and it says you can just use a .txt file to label the ATR files to a drive. Okay. I tried this and can't get the Side3 to recognize this file when I add it to the same directory as the ATR files. I tried googling these .map files and what needs to be done to make it correctly, but I can't find any info. I see the ATR file size for Ultima is well below the 180KB threshold that Side3 is cabable of handling with Standalone use (no U1MB upgrade). 

 

Here is the relevant section in the Side3 manual:

 

"2.15.10 Map Files and Disk Flipping Sometimes it’s necessary to mount multi-disk ATR sets and tagging each file individually can be a tedious process. ‘Map’ files make this easier by automating the mounting procedure. A map file is simply a plain DOS/Windows/Unix text file containing EOL terminated lines comprising a drive number, optional path and filename: Dd:[path]filename.ext ‘Dd:’ represents the target drive number on which the image will be mounted, and the path/filename of the image file should immediately follow on the same line. For example, you might create a file called ‘Ballyhoo.map’ and add the following two lines: D1:Ballyhoo (s1).atr D2:Ballyhoo (s2).atr When you press Return on ‘Ballyhoo.map’, the loader will mount the two ATRs on the specified drives and – if successful – reboot the Atari (if an error occurs, a message will be displayed and the computer will not be rebooted). In this case, the ATRs must reside in the same folder as the map file. If the ATR files reside in a different folder to the map file, include the path: D1:\ATRs\Demos\Sweet Illusions (s1).atr D2:\ATRs\Demos\Sweet Illusions (s2).atr" 

 

I also tried to manually add drive assignment with "Control" "Return" but this has not worked for me, as I can't seem to assign more than one drive this way, thus the need for the map file. 

 

Can somebody please point me in the right direction to be able to swap between two ATR files to access the next disc, like the character disk in Ultima?

Edited January 28 by bytebinge

[_The Doctor__]

the text file should not be .txt but rather .map when saving it.

[Peri Noid]

22 minutes ago, bytebinge said:

I look in the manual for the Side3 and it says you can just use a .txt file to label the ATR files to a drive.

Do not confuse a file with a .txt extension with a file containing plain text.

[bytebinge]

I created the two line drive assignment structure as cited in the manual and changed the .txt to .map: is there some other way or something that I am missing? The .map file doesn't show in my Side3 when I go to view it.

Edited January 28 by bytebinge

[bytebinge]

Okay. I now realize that simply editing and changing the ext wasn't enough, I had to "save as" and make sure it didn't save as text file. Okay, I got that far. Now it shows on the Side3. So now, it is telling me "Error: Bad ATR". If I run the atr itself, it usually loads...what can i do to get around this "Error: Bad ATR" negative response from the Side3?

[_The Doctor__]

the text file should not be .txt but rather .map when saving it. if you are using a win/lin/tel/fruit box instead of an Atari to create the .map make sure it's translated properly. I just use the Atari itself and avoid worrying about settings and saving methods on win/lin/tel/fruit boxes

[bytebinge]

@_The Doctor__ How do I create a .map with the Atari itself? 

[_The Doctor__]

use the editor in sdx and save it with .map extender

you can use the screen editor and end with ctrl-3 to do the same

any number of editors will get the job done.

SIO2PC cable/PClink in use.

Edited January 28 by _The Doctor__

[flashjazzcat]

It might be a little circuitous to create the MAP file on the Atari itself since the only DOS currently capable of writing to FAT is the one provided by the SIDE3 Loader itself, and even saving a text file in that manner won't terminate lines with the required CR and/or LF characters. Somehow I'm able to create files in the required format and using the required filename extender in Windows Notepad without much fuss, in any case.

 

If the OP is attempting to do this with anything other than modestly sized ATRs and without the support of Ultimate 1MB, he's likely to run into 'Bad ATR' errors and similar, since the disk image support provided by the soft-loaded patched operating system is somewhat limited (as inferred on Lotharek's product page).

 

 

[bytebinge]

@flashjazzcatI have tried thus far with small ATR files as I read about the 180KB limit. I have tried with the Ultima games from various sources, but am getting the "Bad ATR" for all attempts. Below are the files and relevant configuration lines in the .map file

 

 

Edited January 28 by bytebinge

[flashjazzcat]

I suspect MAP file handling without U1MB PBI BIOS support is broken in the loader, and it might be a while before I'm able to fix that. But I was able to run Ultima (downloaded from AtariMania) just now by manually mounting the two images (using the TAB key to assign a drive number to each image from the drop-down list, and finally pressing CTRL+R to reboot). The disk swap button doesn't work with the soft-loaded OS, however.

 

 

[bytebinge]

@flashjazzcatIs there a way to swap the disk without the hard button on the Side3 or does this mean you just can't do disk swapping without the U1MB? I tried the key combo "CTRL+S" but nothing happens, it just stays on the "Insert player disk" screen.

Edited January 28 by bytebinge

[flashjazzcat]

You can't disk swap without U1MB, at least at the moment. There may be solid design reasons for this: I can't recall right now since I've been totally out of the loop for four months while moving house.

 

The CTRL+S shortcut is a loader shortcut, so works only in the loader. For this to work outside of the loader, the operating system's keyboard dispatcher would need patching (and no such functionality has yet been implemented).

[bytebinge]

@flashjazzcatUnderstood. Thank you for confirming this for me and helping me to avoid further headache by trying various methods, only to induce further iterations of futility in a never ending cycle of time wastery. I am gonna upgrade to the U1MB, as I was not aware of this inability to swap disks without it. Originally, I thought omitting the U1MB upgrade, just kept me from playing games that required X amount of RAM. Now that I know this pivotal feature of disk swapping it tied to the U1MB upgrade, I will save myself the hassle and "Just do it". 

[flashjazzcat]

You will not look back once U1MB is installed, especially with regard to disk image support and compatibility. But you also get built-in high-speed SIO and a host of other productivity features.

 

Prior to SIDE3 (with SIDE2), there was no stand-alone (without U1MB) disk image support whatsoever, but since SIDE3 has a large amount of on-board RAM, we took the opportunity to implement rudimentary support which doesn't rely on U1MB. This required me to re-implement much of the functionality of the U1MB PBI BIOS inside the SIDE3 Loader itself, emulating the API of the PBI driver in order to avoid coding up two entirely different disk image mounting methods inside the loader. It was an enormous amount of effort for something which is still grossly inferior to the ATR support provided when U1MB is present.