Feature request(s) - Hostbridge Midi, Maybe Win98 support

[mph]

There has been some desire for USB midi support, on Aros. I intend to look at it myself, but its mixed in a long list of things to do.

How hard would it be to have regular Aros Midi bridge through to Windows Midi? Most people looking for Midi are probably wanting to run Aros without Windows. But having "ANY" option for real Midi might draw more general interest.

Also, I wanted to see what error came up, when trying Hostbridge on Win98. I converted the cmd files to batch, minus .Net (no Windows app linking). The command line support tools (exe) all work. I'm guessing this is because MinGW is used. The launch of Hostbridge can't locate memory to reserve. I imagine that if this was resolved, there are going to be other problems. Are there some total show stoppers, that make Win98 a fat chance? Or is this something that could be done?

[mph]

I don't actually expect support for this. It is an informal report.
So the actual error for AROSBootstrap.exe on Win98 is

Bootstrap Failed to allocate 256MB of RAM for AROS:00000002 No such file or directory

Is Hostbrige closed source?

[origami]

How hard would it be to have regular Aros Midi bridge through to Windows Midi?

Depends on what you expect from that "bridge".

ofc, I can take an educated guess when it comes to midi but still, my guess might be different from your thoughts when you wrote the question 


Hostlib.resource can access libraries on the host and call/invoke individual library function entries.

This solution is used on several occasions for AROS hosted platforms

In case you have some programming background/knowledge then you can take a look at it with a search like this and look at some of the implementations (just take a couple of page-clicks to run into mentions like ALSA/socket/SDL).

Having said that, there are (or can be) some practical issues:
- Hostlib calls must be locked which has a performance penalty for AROS.
- There are some issues with hostlib

Also, I wanted to see what error came up, when trying Hostbridge on Win98.

I can't answer your specific question there but, since you ask this question in one go with the first question you asked I wondered if this question has anything in common with that first question. E.g. are you trying to get midi files played using the host OS (in this case win98) or something similar ?

Do note that there are some issues with .net and win98.

Other than that I have no knowledge whatsoever when it comes to .net as it is an accident waiting to happen (security wise).


In your second post in this thread your write:

So the actual error for AROSBootstrap.exe on Win98 is
....

Well... how much memory does that win98 machine actually have ?

Why do you run the bootstrap in such a way that you instruct it to use 256 mb of memory ?

fwiw: AROS automatically assigns a (minimal) amount of memory it requires by default. Using other options is something you could try after things initially work.


You are all over the place with your questions 

I am assuming that this probably is because you are mixing some terminology (which is not an issue in itself but it can work confusing) but even when it is not the case: hostbridge has nothing to do with running AROS hosted or the hosted AROS Bootstrap executable other then hostbridge being a terminology used describe some form of interaction that allows AROS (native) to execute commands on the host.

afaik hostbridge is not closed source but you would have to ask Paolone (creator/maintainer of Icaros Desktop) to make sure of that.

fwiw Paolone's hostbridge implementation is not exactly rocket science though and could be replaced with any other solution you prefer. It does however exist for a longer period of time and thus offers a well tested solution with most (if not all) common errors/issues encountered being fixed and/or workaround (not to mention being able to ask someone to your questions when running into issues  ).

cheerios

[mph]

origami, thanks for the reply.

- Hostlib calls must be locked which has a performance penalty for AROS.

This basically answers the Midi question. A performance penalty would be a pretty big issue, for most users.

E.g. are you trying to get midi files played using the host OS (in this case win98) or something similar ?

The two questions are separate, and I probably should have posted them separate. But that is somewhat irrelevant, (read on).

Win9x and WinNT are different, but from my understanding the differences between them won't change the "locked call" issue. Perhaps playback might be an option. But composition requires low latency midi recording, that is synchronous with playback.

The interest in Win98 "was" that Hostbridge is not intended to run on it. The installation scripts are .cmd, not .bat. There are Cmd environments for Win9x. But the modern syntax used during installation is beyond them. However, these scripts seem to only be a part of Icaros. Aros hosted does not have them. And the issue seems to be with Hosted itself.

.net is only an issue, if you really must have Icaros links to host applications. The installer explains this, when it detects that .net is not installed. It should not be an issue with simply running "Aros Hosted" (which is actually what I wanted).

Why do you run the bootstrap in such a way that you instruct it to use 256 mb of memory ?

The "Icaros" installer actually asks you to input an amount of memory, to reserve for Icaros. It specifically asks you to do so, in multiples of 256.

Also, even Aros Hosted defaults to 256. You can specify less (-m 64), but I get the same error. Only the amount of memory changes to match whatever was specified.

I am assuming that this probably is because you are mixing some terminology (which is not an issue in itself but it can work confusing) but even when it is not the case: hostbridge has nothing to do with running AROS hosted or the hosted AROS Bootstrap executable other then hostbridge being a terminology used describe some form of interaction that allows AROS (native) to execute commands on the host.

Yes, this "IS" the case. I am specifically addressing the implementation used on Icaros. I did forget that Aros itself releases "the" hosted version. Even so, It was my assumption that Aros Hosted is not supported on Win9x. However, it does state that while being developed on WinXP, it should work with all 32bit versions (Win98 and up). But that text is likely out of date, since it has probably been awhile since development happened on WinXP.

So, I am barking up the wrong tree, which answers many questions. In conclusion, if there is an issue with "Aros Hosted", on Win98, I will likely need to resolve it myself. At least, now it is cleared up and I can reference the "Aros Hosted" sources.

[paolone]

Hello.


Hosted AROS is the bare operating system running on hosted.


HostBridge is a set of scripts, aros and non-aros tools that let the user start host (Windows/Linux) software from AROS environment.

Nothing is closed source. AROS itself is open source. Hostbridge scripts are... well.. scripts: you can always peek at them to understand how they run. Not that there's much secret, I once wrote a full documentation about it.

Problem with HostBridge is most of the tools it uses are WinNT-compatible only, so this cuts any Windows 9X/ME version off. You will have to find sources for them and recompile with anything that could let executables run on Win 9X. Good luck. I am in no way planning to support this effort, though.