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Post by cdm on Aug 23, 2023 20:12:54 GMT 1
Downloaded vDOS with the intent of running an old CAD/CAM program (SmartCam 4.5, circa 1988) on a newer PC, as our 1990s PC here at work is on its last leg. Was able to boot up the menu and text (g-code) editing features of the program, but if I try to get into the drafting (shaping) part of the program, I get the following error: CGI initialization error -3003.
This is probably little information to work with, but where can I start on getting this fixed?
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Post by Jos on Aug 23, 2023 21:09:25 GMT 1
"CGI" won’t refer to "Common Gateway Interface".
Something like "Character Graphic Interface", displaying semi-graphics in text mode by loading a special designed bitmap character font. vDos however uses a (scalable) TTF font and that doesn’t mix with (fix sized) bitmap fonts. Sorry, but nothing to do about that.
You will instead have to try an emulator using bitmap fonts, like DOSBox.
Jos
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Post by cdm on Aug 24, 2023 15:27:15 GMT 1
Actually tried DOSBox already too and received the same error. Playing with it some more I was able to generate a different error, this time "GSS*CGI device not loaded". I looked through the DOS drive in the old PC and was able to locate a folder inside labeled CGI, with various files inside including a GSSCGI.sys file. I replicated the all DOS files and environment inside vDOS/DOSBox directories with no luck. Trying to figure out if manually installing the .sys file somewhere would solve the issue but not sure where to start.
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Post by Jos on Aug 24, 2023 17:56:15 GMT 1
Looking for GSSCGI.sys in my archives, I found it in a SC5 (SuperCalc 5) and DEMOPLUS directory. The latter could be helpful, it contains several programs. I ran the intriguing DRIVERS.EXE in DOSBox, with this promising outcome: INT 59h is documented by Ralph Grown’s Interrupt List as: INT 59 is the means by which GSS*CGI language bindings communicate with GSS*CGI device drivers and the GSS*CGI device driver controller.. Also used by the IBM Graphic Development Toolkit. Though not much more info than that. I’ll send you a zipped copy of the DEMOPLUS directory. Perhaps it will indeed be helpful. Jos
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Post by cdm on Aug 24, 2023 19:41:25 GMT 1
Jos - Thank you for your help. Seems I may be on the way to getting somewhere with this. Been playing with replacing various files from PLUSDEMO with the original CGI files from the old PC in DOSBox. Best result I am able to get at this time looks like this
"TRANSIENT GSS DRIVERS ARE NOT IN MEMORY -- NO ACTION TAKEN"
Attachments:
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Post by Jos on Aug 24, 2023 20:05:48 GMT 1
Perhaps you get more info if you start vDos with the log option (….\vDos.exe /log).
Look in to generated vDos.log file for LOADEXEC entries. Could be SmartCam tries to load an executable. And references to INT 59. OPENFILE failed entries may also reveal if SmartCam is missing something.
Jos
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