justacruzr2

How often does this happen? For me, 2 times in the past 20 years.

Sorry I missed your reply. I guess you saw what I saw too. I could cut the arms with a diagonal (while protecting the platen to get it out safely) but what could I do about putting it in the donor drive. It has to be the same model drive and it would be the same situation. However, even though we don't see it, there has to be a way to remove them. They were put in at the factory and must be able to be removed(somehow). I'll bet that's why it came back to me 2 days later. They couldn't figure out how to remove them either.

"In some ways, COBOL is still a "Hot" language." That system I created was totally written in COBOL. I really like that language because it is so easy to get things done. Something that might take 25 lines of "C" to accomplish can be done in COBOL with only 2 or 3 lines of code. On the backside of that, "C" can give you control down to the system level whereas COBOL can't. It's an application program language which was specifically created for business but can do more than just that. "my mother worked for "Cray Research" Now there's a computer! It runs so fast it has to be cooled by liquid nitrogen. Only have ever seen a picture of it. I'm told there's one in southern Illinois at SIU. One of my favorite things to do on the S390 was to go into the SDSF facility (System Display and Search Facility) and watch other peoples programs blow-up. You could also see the execution time for programs. Most ran in about .03 seconds. Talk about fast. TSO and ISPF were 2 other facilities availble for use. "So did my cousin. I had the Tandy Color Computer II. We both got them as hand-me-downs. They were beyond their expiration date, at that time. I never actually learned the included Basic. I just copied text, from old magazines." Was one of those mags "Compute"? I did the same thing too but also wrote some of my own. "If it was IDE, I'm not sure they even plugged it in." It was. I have taken a few apart over the years. Ones that were just junk so it didn't matter what happened. I did open that one up too, but I couldn't see how to remove the read/write arms without dragging them across the platens which would have caused further problems. I do have the tools though. I have read where each hard drive is calibrated at the factory and you just can't swap the platens from a bad drive to a good drive without swapping the circuit board too. The calibration is set on the chip that's on that board and no 2 are the same. That link you provided was interesting. I had a program I found on the web that let you emulate the mainframe MVS environment on a PC, but my computer didn't meet the minimum requirements. QWS3270 is a program that I do have on my system. It turns the PC into an IBM3270 terminal so that you can communicate with the mainframe. You should be able to find it out there as a free download if you're interested. Should we take this conversation private? We're getting off-topic but I do enjoy it.

"Thanks, for sharing some of your history. I enjoyed it." Glad you did. All the languages I mentioned above I have programmed in. Here's a little more history. The ML/Binary and Assembly were on an IBM 360, The RPG was on an IBM 370 System3 and the COBOL/JCL/DB2/CICS was on an IBM S390. Programming on a mainframe is awesomely cool. They are just so fast. And it's nice to program in an environment that is bullet-proof bug-wise. I have also programmed in Basic and COBOL on the PC. For my 1st computer (the little TI99 4/A) I also have C, Forth, Pascal and a couple others I don't remember right now. I've never used them though.....yet! One day I'll get around to it. The early backup of that system I was working on that I lost will have to be run thru the compiler again to see where I left off. It's a good thing though that I kept all my notes and the sample forms. If I get back to it they should help me get back up to speed but I doubt I can completely put it back to where I had it. There was so much and I had it completely de-bugged. And I have never really let it go....it still bugs me. Just less than it did at first. I do have the drive that it was on still. 2 years ago I brought it over to Best Buy to have them retrieve whatever was on it that could be saved but they returned it to me 2 days later saying there was nothing. I really never believed that. There must be something on there that can be saved. At least I would like to take a look myself and verify that.

"Please forgive, I'm having a histamine attack today" Hope you're feeling better now. And I did understand your reply. Seems like you know or know about several modern programming languages. My experience is limited to the older ones. I've programmed in ML (Machine Language/Binary), Assembly, RPG, Cobol, CICS, JCL, DB2 and Basic. There is also the consideration, especially on older systems, that Intel did not put the CPU instruction set in the same place on the chip address-wise. I've talked with some older programmers who would complain that code would sometimes have to be re-written due to this. But I think this had to do with changes between the 286, 386 and 486 chips and then the Pentium line. I think they have probably standardized it by now. It's been about 10 years since I did any programming. The last thing I was working on was lost when the hard drive crashed. I had 7 years invested in that. It was a large project. I only just recently was able to recover an old backup of it which unfortunately is 7 years older than the last time I worked on it. Trying to remember everything I did during those 7 years is impossible. I should have made a more recent backup. Live and learn. Nothing new on the Java front. I've taken a break to let my mind clear. I do this sometimes so I can come back to it with a fresh perspective. Oh, it wasn't Nero but I think it was one of the other Java updates. I have Java 5 update 18, 21 and 22. I probably grabbed the wrong one and didn't notice.

I think your right. When I had the chance last Friday I pulled it back in and couldn't find it either. Don't know why I said that. Still think there's a way to do it though. I'll have to look at it some more. I just downloaded go1.20.1.windows-386.zip. Looking forward to trying it. Looks a little like "C" with the braces. Thanks for pointing me in the right direction.

Thanks for the info. And we can close this thread. The info I got off of the ITPro website worked and Nero 7 is installed just the way I wanted it. Thanks for your and everyone else's help. Now just the Java remains.

So such a tool exists? I have wanted something like that for awhile. With that you can zero in on exactly what is causing the problem. When you step thru you can see what instruction caused the error and then examine that instruction to see why. I have that kind of app for my 1st computer. A TI99/4a. Yes it still works and I have it fully configured (hardware-wise) as far as it can go. The app is called Explorer and you can toggle between the detailed info screen (which includes the registers and instructions being executed and the user GUI which allows you to see the changes made as you step thru the instructions. Also have all the old games that ran on it and I also have a program that will read those game files and transfer them to my other computers. That will allow me to 1) burn them to disk so I can protect them from loss (they are on 5 1/4" floppies) and 2) run them on my "more modern" computers using the VM that emulates a TI 994/a on an IBM clone type computer. There are actually a couple of those emulators out there and they work very well. The one I have is PC99. Do you know the names of any of those tools?

That's a good point. I suppose though, with so many things changing in IT and the internet, you would still have to keep it up to date with the changes which would make the previous version obsolete but you could still keep it 'static" and able to be used on any OS. Never heard of GO before. Is it a programming language? That's what happened the first time I brought it into HxD. I edited the UPDATE value and re-saved it but it no longer had the Java icon and when I tried to run it I got an error message that the file was corrupt. Probably due to HxD saving it exactly as you see it on the screen. That's why I will try the disk editor. Sneak in and sneak out. HxD will give me the position in the file where that value is located and with that I should be able to go to that point in the file and make that change. I like outwitting these smarty pants apps. Usually I'm successful but not always....we'll see. I was really surprised when Norton did that. Actually that's some pretty clever programming. Never seen an app do that before. Usually they will issue a warning message that they couldn't load some file and the OS just carries on as usual. That was what I was hoping so that I didn't have to disturb anything.

I've been thinking along similar lines also. I have this suspicion that it might be Norton Utilities. It has several monitors going during a session that intercept files when they are deleted and protects them (Norton Protection). I guess it's possible that it somehow interferes with these 2 installs. So Last night I renamed the Norton Utilities folder and you'll never guess what it did on restart. It changed the registry entry to point to the newly re-named folder. Pretty sneaky Huh? I guess the only way to test that suspicion is to uninstall it.

I didn't mean written in Java. Whatever language is used for such a thing. A good example of a stand alone app is Sun Microsystems StarOffice 5.2. It's the equivalent of MS Office. It's 186MB in size and is composed of 2,125 files. It uses no Windows OS files and doesn't even make 1 registry entry. It uses the old style cfg and ini files for that. It also includes Adabas which is an SQL language similar to the other SQL languages (Access for instance). I have it on all 3 of my OS's: 98SE, ME and XP Pro SP3. It came bundled with my computer when I bought it. You just unzip the file and copy it over to the root directory. I think you might be able to find it out there as a free download now. It runs on any Windows OS. Just out of curiosity, I loaded the Java 5 update 22 into HxD last night. HxD is a hex editor that's a free download. I've used it for years to examine files. You can view and edit any file on any device including the BIOS ROM on the motherboard. Anyway I saw where the Java update looks at version.dll to get the version of the OS, the website link it wants to go to for the update (https://java.com/update/jre1.0.5_22), and the variable GET_UPDATE=1. I think I can use my disk editor to change the value of that variable to zero (0), or maybe just copy the version.dll over from ME and let it think it's on Millennium and see what happens.

Also, this is the Nero 7 that comes bundled with a new CD/DVD drive (the NOT FOR RESALE version). I did find some install options/switches yesterday on the ITPro website and I copied them into a Notepad file. But they were talking about deploying it in a company network setting so I'm not sure if that Nero 7 is different than mine and whether those install options will work with the version I have. But it's worth a try. As for the MSI, it is the correct version (I think it's 2.0.2600.2) and the same one as ME but this is the first app so far that has used it. You might be right about corruption (broken?). Sorry, I take that back. The Jave 5 Update 7 did use it so I would guess it's OK.

You know...that's exactly what I was thinking. Everything else I've installed has had no problems including all the 3rd party apps I've installed which are the same as what's on ME. These 2 things have been the only difficulty. And what is curiously interesting is that these are both German applications (anything AG or GmBH is of German origin). Please no one take that the wrong way. I just mean that they might have a different way of coding over there. Java and Nero are the only ones I've seen that use that unusual install menu.

No. This is a fresh install of 98se with all the official MS updates installed. Nero has never been on it yet.

Thanks. I just downloaded the nss files from the first link you provided. I have tried FF 8 and 10. Without the updated nss files they are pretty much the same as 3 except the bookmarks don't work (well known problem). I really didn't like that. Sometime in the future I will try one of those other browsers you mention. Actually been meaning to read the various discussions here about browsing in the here and now (2023) with the old 9x OS's. I guess it is visionary but it is true. That's what ties browsers to certain OS'S. They are taking advantage of the already written routines that come with Windows. I don't blame them. It saves them time writing the code. Guess I would probably do the same. Who knows. Maybe some ambitious programmer will have mercy on us.