NetDrive Psion plugin

Introduction. When I wrote Psion utilities for OS/2 I dreamt about writing of specialized Installable File System (IFS) communication between Psion and OS/2. However writing an IFS is a task for nerveless people. I had found all tools, documentation and libraries which were necessary for that task but couldn't make up my mind to that. Than, I have found a short announcement about NetDrive V2.0, it had to support third party plugins. I used NetDrive v1.X in that time, so I have decided it would be a great solution for the IFS writing problem. I had contacted the NetDrive development team and they were very kind and granted me the access to the NetDrive Plugins Development Kit. And now I'm proud to introduce the first version of Psion plugin for NetDrive.

What is Psion plugin ? Psion plugin is a dynamic loadable library for Psion link and file access protocols. Strictly speaking, every NetDrive plugin is a part of the NetDrive IFS (NDFS). OS/2 treats NDFS as one IFS, but actually it is a set of IFSes with a common interface. So, this design allows, just with one or two commands, load and unload different IFSs, mount and unmount resources with different inner structure and nature without rebooting. The IFS design also allows to integrate different resources into OS/2 seamlessly.

What can and can't the Psion plugin do ? Psion plugin allows you to perform almost any file operation allowed in OS/2 - copying, moving, deleting files and directories. Psion plugin doesn't support reconnect at all, but it's very easy to reconnect with NetDrive commands (just unmount the Psion resource and then mount it again). Psion plugin doesn't perform any file conversion, it works with files without any intervention in their content.

How to install ? AT the moment, installation of the third party plugins for NetDrive isn't automated at all. So, you need to perform some tasks manually. Psion plugin is contained in one archive psiplug.zip. You have to unzip it into a free directory. Then put the content of the resulting sub-directory NDPLUGS into the corresponding directory inside the NetDrive directory (usually C:\NDFS\NDPLUGS). Copy psion.cmd and reconnect.cmd sample command files into the NetDrive directory (C:\NDFS). And the last task, you should add the reference to the Psion plugin into the NetDrive configuration file - find and open file ndctl.cfg in the your NetDrive folder, find the line begins with:

Plugins=ndplocal...

Add at the end of this line the name of the Psion plugin - ndppsion. After this modification, this line will look like :

Plugins=ndplocal...,ndppsion

Save and close the configuration file.

I don't know how experienced user you are, so you should reboot your computer. It's not necessary to reboot for NetDrive to accept most of changes in ndctl.cfg, it's enough kill and restart ndctl.exe. But if you don't know how to do that, it will be better for you to reboot.

How to work with Psion plugin ? Switch on your Psion first. Turn on the remote link on your Psion (follow the documentation for Psion). As every of the NetDrive resources, Psion plugin has to be mounted before using. There is a sample command file for mounting Psion - psion.cmd:

ndattach u:
ndcreatemp u:\MyPsion
ndmount psion u:\MyPsion PSICP=ibm-1251;PSICOM=com1;PSIBAUD=115200 rw

First line - create a new NetDrive drive letter.

Second line - create the mount point for mounting the Psion resource.

Third line - mount Psion plugin into the created mount point. There are three parameters for the Psion plugin.

PSICP - the name of the code page used on your Psion. This parameter is necessary to show Psion filenames in a correct form. The value of this parameter can be any of OS/2 codepage names. The default value for this parameter is current default code page in your OS/2.

PSICOM - the name of the serial port to communicate to your Psion. It can be either - com1, com2... etc. Default serial port name is com2.

PSIBAUD - the baud rate to communicate to your Psion. You should set the same speed as you are going to set on your Psion. Default serial port speed is 115200.

After mounting, you may go to the NetDrive drive. When you open MyPsion folder you will see some sub-directories - C$,D$,..Z$. Each of these sub-directories corresponds to Psion drives - C:, D:...Z: (Z: drive is a ROM drive on your Psion, PsiWin doesn't show this drive at all). That's all. Now you can manipulate with Psion files as well as with all other files in your OS/2.

If your Psion went to sleep you should switch it on and run another command file - reconnect.cmd. Communication will be restored. If you want to finish work with Psion, you should unmount the Psion resource :

ndunmount u:\MyPsion 0

If you have bug report or suggestions, you are welcome :-)

Credits:
Philip Proudman <philip.proudman@btinternet.com>
Alexander Thoukydides <alex@thouky.co.uk>
Hans Hockx <jcm.hockx@hccnet.nl>
Vitali E. Pelenyov <sunlover@anduin.net>
NetDrive Development team <netdrive@bmtmicro.net>

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