This file relates to version 1.0 of the MMURTL
computer operating system that accompanies the
book:

   MMURTL-V1.0

This discusses known problems trying to run MMURTL, as well
as bugs, and portions of the code that are incomplete

1) LOADING AND RUNNING MMURTL

	If MMURTL will not run on your system, you may have to
	remove EMM386 from your Autoexec.BAT or Config.sys file.
	EMM386 doesn't take kindly to hostile memory take-overs.

	If you receive an error during file system initialization or
	hard disk device driver installation:

    a) Your disk controller may not be supported.
    MMURTL has some problems with some of the newer 32 bit
    disk controllers that move data directly between the 
    drive and memory.
    All ISA driven controllers seem to work fine (I have
    tested more than 12 different ISA IDE controllers).
    I have also tested many PCI based controllers and they
    seem to work ok too.  I have no problems running MMURTL
    on my 233 Mhz Pentium MMX with a PCI controller so it
    can be done!  I have no idea what effect the UDMA
    33 and 66 PCI controllers will have.

    b) SCSI disks and other SCSI devices are not supported.
    (no SCSI driver)

    c) Your data may be compressed by MS-DOS or another product
    such as Stacker. MMURTL does not support disk data compression.

    d) If you are running OS/2 V2.x or Warp (V3.x or V4.x), 
    MMURTL doesn't recognize the multiboot partition correctly.
    You can copy the MMSYS directory to a floppy and run it
    from there to test it.

2) WHAT'S NOT DONE??

	FILESYSTEM:

	a) The file system call to remove a directory is not completed
	so I didn't include it. Use MS-DOS to get rid of directories if
	needed.

	DLLs:

	a) DLLs are not supported. AND NEVER WILL BE - I hate them...

	LOADING DEVICE DRIVERS:

	a) Device drivers can't be loaded dynamically. If you need to add
	a driver you will have to build it into the OS (sounds like Unix...)
        That's actually	quite easy to do, so I didn't strain myself 
        getting it done.

	DASM LIBARARY SEARCH FUNCTION

	a) The search function (.SEARCH command) is not fully implimented.
	The work around is quite easy, and really there is not much
	library code to search through at this point in time.
	Simply include the ASM modules in the ATF file. All of the sample
	programs and the operating system are built this way right now.
	They should provide you with good examples.

	COMMAND LINE INTERPRETER

	a) There is no wildcard feature in the file system or any
	template matching code in a library. This means *.* has no
	effect. The copy, rename, and delete functions all take single
	filenames.

3)  BUGS

	OPERATING SYSTEM

	a) On occasion, when a program is beating the filesystem to death
	and you attempt to load and run another CLI, the system crashes.
	It doesn't even make it into the debugger. It is apparently a
	processor double fault. Still looking for this one....

	b) The CTRL-ALT-DELETE function is a rather nasty way to shut down
	an application.	It was a late addition, but was necessary. On
	occasion is causes some problems. The system still functions and
	tasks appear to be running fine - but every once in a while when
	you use it, you can't switch to the other applications. This IS
	a problem I'm still looking for.

	CM32 C Compiler

	a) Occasionally when you have accidentally "nested" a function
	(which is not allowed in C) the compiler goes into a loop...
	It's churning away somehwere. I just haven't found out where
	that is yet.

4) An updated Filesystem is included for download but not incorporated
 - you have to do it by replacing the file. I did not want to
mess with the code so it folloows the book exactly. Otherwise I
would have create a confusing mess!  

This is STILL version 1.0. You WILL find many other problems.
Let me know if you get the time. Send E-Mail to rburgess@aol.com.
(Please, bugs only - and yes, the AOL email address is still mine
after 6 years.)

Quite obviously, neither myself nor the publisher has time to really
support a product of this complexity. You're on your own. BUT at least
you DO have the source code.

Thanks, and I hope you get something out of all this!

Richard Burgess
Alexandria, VA.
1995-1999

P.S. Most of this text is 6 years old but still applies.
HOWEVER, with a publisher like Sensory willing to keep a BBS
up and running for user exchange and support - maybe MMURTL
will take off like I wanted it to in the first place...
I'm not sure how much time I'll have to help, but it is tempting
and MMURTL really is a sweet OS.  I've never run it on a PII
or PIII - let's hear it out there.... whoa... who's got the guts?
But it does run on my IBM Aptiva 233Mhz MMX... Hmmm. 
Not bad for 5 years later. It does cough on the bigger disk
quite often though.