Printing paper tape

[Qbus]

Ok, so this is the problem. I now have a copy of Basic for the Nova, the new issue is that I have it in the form of a 47K .9TRK file, I can open the file and read it in Hex Edit, can read it in Octal and that would be a direct entry method if I wanted to do a couple thousand key strokes. The next question is how do I get this into my system? On my system I have a paper tape reader, a serial port and of course the switches and lights on the front panel. So how can I get a 9TRK file to a serial port to feed a paper tape punch? I have a good paper tape reader and punch that’s feed by serial data, also have lots of systems from DOS only to windows base system but how do I get one of them to read that file and push it out the serial port for the tape punch?

I know back in the old days of plain text files you can do a DOS command like type XXX.bat to com1 but don’t know what will happen if I tell the system to type the contents of a XXX.9trk file to com 1?

I do want to do a paper tape of this file.

Going to stick this in a couple places being its both a PC/DOS and Nova question and I would accept an answer from anyone at this point.

 

[Chuck(G)]

If I were in your position, I'd drop Bruce Ray a note at Wild Hare Computing. If there's anything about DG that he doesn't know, I'm not aware of it.

 

[QuantX]

That 9TRK file is an archived a copy of a physical magnetic tape of BASIC. All of the 9TRK files Bruce released are in the SimH tape format and can be conveniently loaded by the emulator.

That copy of BASIC expects to be loaded from a physical magnetic tape drive so unless you have one you're not going to get far. You'll need to find a version of basic which can be loaded from paper tape instead.

It's also likely that you'll need a copy of RDOS installed on the system.

 

[kgober]

My guess would be to load the .9trk magtape image into a simulated Nova in SIMH, then write out a virtual paper tape. Then punch the virtual paper tape file to physical paper tape, then read that in on your real hardware.