Re: iic boot from serial port?

[Paul Guertin <pg@sff.net>]

CUTjefbla@bconnex.net (Jeff Blakeney) wrote:

> On 14 Feb 2001 08:28:31 +0100, pausch@saaf.se (Paul Schlyter) wrote:
> 
> >Why bother with the serial port?  Why not instead use the parallell
> >port also on the Apple II side?  By using the various printer status
> >lines as input, one can transfer a whole nibble at a time, and not
> >just one bit at a time as on the serial port.
> 
> The problem here is that the only bi-directional parallel card for the
> Apple II that I'm aware of is the Profile controller card and it is
> pretty rare.

You can get bidirectional communication with a standard Grappler
card (and, I imagine, many other cards) by using the printer status
lines as input, as Paul said. These are lines normally used for things
like "paper out", "printer ready" and so on. Of course, it means you
have to make a special cable that will cross the right lines, and
write your own low-level drivers.

Paul Guertin
pg@sff.net