CP/NC

Control Program for Amstrad NC100 Notepad Computers

CP/NC is a CP/M-compatible operating system for the Amstrad NC100 Notepad Computer. It is based on Russell Marks's ZCN operating system, but focuses more on CP/M compatibility and makes the computer "feel" more like an old-fashioned CP/M box.

While ZCN is a rather playful system that adopts lots of features and external programs from DOS and Unix, CP/NC goes back to the roots: you will find a rather minimal CCP and the usual external commands, such as DUMP, PIP, STAT, and SYSGEN. CP/NC also changes the layout of the LCD console from 120x10 characters to a more readable 80x8.

Here is a summary of what CP/NC is and is not as well as a list of differences between CP/NC and ZCN.

To install CP/NC, you wil need an NC100 computer (or an emulator), a nullmodem cable, a PCMCIA SRAM card, and a computer running an XMODEM file transfer program (you can find one for Unix below).

Download Area

CP/NC

cpnc11b.zip (~600KB)

This archive contains the CP/NC operating system itself: pre-compiled binaries, the complete documentation, and its full source code.

nc100em-1.31.tgz (~85KB)

This is Russell Marks's NC100 emulator for Unix, slightly hacked for CP/NC. It has been a valuable tool in the development of CP/NC and it allows you to run the OS even if you do not have an actual NC100. There is a (serial line-only) text-mode emulator and an X11-based one that also emulates the LCD console.

Helpful Programs

Not CP/NC programs, but programs that can be helpful for exchanging data with CP/NC.

lrzsz-0.12.20.tar.gz (~275KB)

This package contains file transfer programs providing the XMODEM, YMODEN, and ZMODEM protocols. LRZSZ is Uwe Ohse's revised version of Omen Technology's public domain RZSZ package. It should compile on most Unix systems.

Supported Programs

This is a collection of some programs that have been tested under CP/NC and work fine. If you are the creator or owner of one of these programs and think it should not be here, please contact me and I will remove it.

All archives are in LZH format.

LHRD11.LZH (17KB)

The most important thing first: a program for extracting LZH files. You will also need LHRD.COM (16KB) in order to extract this archive! :)

BDSC16M.LZH (51KB)

A minimal installation of the BDS C compiler. You can get the full BDS C package, including the source code and manual, on the BD Software homepage.

KLISP.LZH (45 KB)

A small, purely symbolic LISP interpreter with some modern features, like lexical scoping, tail call elimination, and quasiquotation. Full manual and some example programs included. Source code is available.

QTERM43E.LZH (47KB)

The QTERM terminal program. You may also want to get the pre-patched QTERM.COM file (17KB) for CP/NC and the corresponding patch file, QT-CPNC.Z (3KB).

T3XZ.LZH (35KB)

A T3X compiler for CP/M. Small and fast. Compiles directly from T3X to COM. Self-compiles on CP/NC! (Source code must be downloaded separately.)

VDE266.LZH (61KB)

Video Display Editor. Here are a few terminal description file for VINSTALL: CPNC.VDE, CPNC52.VDE. They can be used to patch VDE for the NC100 console or for a serial console on a VT52, respectively.

VE.LZH (21KB)

VE is a small, but hopefully useful subset of the Unix editor VI. It works on the CP/NC console and VT52 terminals and is optimized for use over slow serial lines. Here is the source code (in T3X/Z).

WADE15.LZH (27KB)

Wagner's Debugger. Note that DDT and friends do not work under CP/NC, but this is a good alternative!