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Hombre AMI<>PC software package.

Description

In a nutshell, Hombre is a collection of utilities aimed at users of low end Amiga models (like the A500) who want to transfer files from their PCs. It is both versatile and easy to use. All the software crammed onto the disk comes from legal sources and can be freely distributed (this compilation is NOT for sale).

Features:

Here's a list of features:

Floppy:

FAT16/32 720kb PC floppies support with long file names

scripts for floppy based transfers completely re-written; no need to remove spaces from ADF's filenames and no 30 characters file name limit; you can use those TOSEC ADFs without any hassle, just make sure you split them in half ; scripts to utilize the external drives also included; with the external drive floppy drive transfers are a piece of cake.

DMS and ADZ (gzipped/zipped ADF) support tweaked; great for two drive systems; if the compressed disk image fits onto a 720kb you're good to go; decompression is quite fast so you pretty much get the same speed compared to normal "chopped" ADF transfers because less disk swapping is involved; really only for 2 drive systems; it might work on single drive systems in the minimal mode but is not worth the hassle; use the adf2df0 script and chopped uncompressed ADFs instead; believe me it's better and faster that way

FixDisk is back; undelete, repair, check tool.

SuperDuper; the fastest diskcopy program around (for one drive systems I suggest getting an ADF of X-Copy from the fab X-Copy shrine website and using that for formatting/copying large amounts of disks.

BadFormat; cli-based format command with many verification/check options to make sure the floppy disk you're about to transfer those ADFs is in order.

HackDisk; trackdisk.device replacement; faster, safer; too bad it screws up the track position display in gauge and TD utilities.

TurboDisk; simple disk-cache program that just works; works best with 2 drive systems.

FSDirs; a patch that speeds disk listings; less grunts and a lot faster access to files/directories; it has a nasty bug that confuses the system when recursively copying files (like in 'cp df0: ram: all').

rawread; extended ADFs.

tracktool; ADF tool for writing and reading disks; used in scripts.

CheckDisk; check for bootblock viruses.

NoClick patch included

Serial:

transwarp; 19200 bauds PC>Amiga, 115200 bauds Amiga>PC; works both with windows (ADF Sender Terminal) and Linux (good old dd and /dev/ttySx).

ZModem transfers supported at 19200 bauds both ways; any platform/os with a serial port and a terminal program will do.

twinexpress; fastest serial transfer program around; too bad it requires DOS.

DNET; lets you access a folder on your PC as a local drive and vice-versa (via NET: device); share your mouse and keyboard between the two computers; WinUAE required.

ProNet; like DNet; access Amiga's drives in WinUAE. Works great with ClassicWB; writing ADF directly to disk on the remote (Amiga) machine also is possible (copyhead and flat-handler needed)

Parallel:

Paradise; the best way to transfer ADFs/files really; you can copy files, write/read ADFs directly to/from disks at whooping speeds ; Windows 95/98 (can be made WinXP compatible using the UserPort driver).

apccomm; like Paradise but for Linux; doesn't support direct disk access, too bad

System:

ZShell; the do-all Shell replacement; plenty of in-built commands, pull-down menus, aliases, command line editing; TAB file name completion and plenty more.

PPrefs; Preferences program

TurboTopaz; speeds up text scrolling and topaz.font replacement; 5 different fonts included.

KeyMaps for different layouts

DMouse; great for working with many windows; autofocus, click2front, window switching, cursor blanker and much, much more.

FKeys; window/screen switching utility using keyboard shortcuts.

KeyMenu; access and browse pull-down menus using the keyboard; brilliant little patch.

DME; text editor with plenty of features.

SnoopDos and a screen grabber (PictSaver) are also included.

Gauge; written by Leffman especially for the Hombre package; displays different information about the system (drive head position, free space on disks, free memory, time and date); highly configurable.

recoverable RAM disks (like RAD); you can even boot from one if you wish and have enough memory.

press left-mouse button at start-up for a minimal mode (more memory)

pressing Help lists available aliases.

Future:

remote mode version of Hombre (like in the previous version but better)

VDisk version of Hombre that let's you boot from a RAD like device. Set's up a bootable virtual disk (fast mem also supported), copies the needed files for different methods of transfer (floppy, serial, parallel) and away you go. The internal drive is free and all software is sitting nicely in memory.

Caveats:

ZShell’s in-built move command doesn’t work (don’t know why); also don’t use the ‘all’ switch with the delete command or the Amiga will crash (better use a pattern like ‘delete ram:*’ and press enter every time when prompted) – this only applies to 1.3 version of kickstart. By pressing CTRL+F ZShell can open a file requester and insert selected file’s path/name on the command line but since there’s no asl.library sitting in LIBS: it won’t work. When you start a new CLI the memory clock disappears from the title bar, type ‘memclk on’ to get it back. The ‘show t‘ command crashes when TD is running

when working in minimal mode some programs will refuse to run (this is because of the small height of the screen – just 50 pixels). These include FixDisk, PPrefs, plus possibly others that try to open a window. If you get rid of aliases in this mode (by issuing the unalias command) make sure you provide the -w parameter with correct values (window height not larger than 50 pixels – check zshell’s docs for more info) when issuing newcli or the GURU will pay you a visit

AutoCLI and DMouse have a feature that let’s you start a new CLI by pressing a key combination (LAmiga+Esc). In order to do so they require files that are not available on disk so DON’T try to open new shell windows in this way or it’s CRASH, BOOM, BANG. You can press F10 instead or issue the newcli command

apccomm is included but I haven’t managed to get it working on any of my Linux LiveCd distros but then again it’s been two years since I’ve last used Linux…

When working with serial transfer programs (transwarp, dnet) you need to issue ‘avail -c’ if you plan to change the serial device after having invoked them earlier with a different device (for example you transferred a disk form the Amiga to the PC using transwarp at 115200 baud with BaudBandit and now want to receive an ADF using artser. Type ‘avail -c’ in-between or else the program will fail to open the new device)

Paradise confuses the serial port driver so that at every end of a transfer serial connection is lost (too bad but it's seems that the hardware is at fault as the ports share one signal line)

Thanks:

Leffmann for the great Gauge program!
Zuza for being so kind and considerate throughout my work on Hombre :*;
all the people responsible for the software included (check the read.me file in docs/ on the disk for a detailed list)
Lombi of Anarchy who put together an amazing collection of utilities that inspired me to do something similar;
Pazza of LSD and his ‘LSD Legal Tools’ collection where I got most of the programs from;
Fred Fish for his amazing software collection; (RIP)
creators and maintiners of aminet.net;
Toni Wilen for WinUAE which made my life so much easier when preparing this collection;
Bloodwych for his brilliant classicWB packs which saved me a lot of time and effort;
Paul for helping me out with the wiki page; (RIP)
Tygrys for lending me his A500 (wielkie dzieki!);
Zetr0 for the webspace (I'm sure I'll find some use for it :) cheers!)
scaf for his ADFDump disk;
Josh for the SAAR PD disks;
Jimbo for his great FTP server;
Nyder, frantic for offering their help with testing the package (appreciate it!);
Alexh for useful suggestions;
ppa.pl staff (especially mailman – you ROCK) for a fantastic web site;
all active EAB users for making it the best Amiga related website in the galaxy;

History:

12-12-2006 v0.1a-03b internal versions

25-02-2007 v0.4b first public release

22-08-2007 v0.5 second public release

27-06-2009 v0.89rc1 release candidate 1

29-05-2011 v1.01 third public release

Credits:

add36k: Alexander Rawass apccomm: Ralf Hoffmann arp.library: check the read.me file for a complete list artser.device: CBM & Arthur Hagen as21k: Mathias Axelsson autocli: Nic Wilson baudbandit.device: Christian Buchner bformat: Bob Bush, R.W.Bowers, T.A.Nery dcopy: Coding by TURBOBRAIN & graphics by NICK23 Original copy routines by R.GELFAND & S.THUBEAUVILLE dmouse, dnet: Matt Dillon fat95: Torsten Jager fixdisk: Werner Guenther flat-handler: Olaf Barthel for: Fabio Rossetti funzip: Mark Adler (original code) Paul Kienitz, John Bush, Walter Haidinger (Amiga port) hackdisk.device: Dan Babcock, Harry Sintonen loadlib: Kenneth C. Nilsen makeres: Gunther Nikl messydisk.device: Olaf Seibert netdnet-handler, netkeys: Doug Walker, John Toebes newtopaz: METALLION of KEFRENS noreq, pprefs: Jonathan Potter paradise: Giuseppe Mignogna ped: Frank Wille pictsaver, td: Preben Nielsen ppmore: Nico François rawread: Toni Wilen sd-aux-handler: Steve Drew snoopdos: Eddy Carroll testlmb: Ed Mackey tracktool: Codetapper transwarp: Wolfgang Stoeggl twinexpress: OMNICODE xpkmaster.library: Dirk Stoecker, Christian von Roques, Urban Dominik Mueller xprd: Oliver Wagner xprzmodem.library: Rick Huebner zshell: Martin Gierich, Paul Hayter