FLEX is a discontinued single-tasking
operating system
An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware, software resources, and provides common daemon (computing), services for computer programs.
Time-sharing operating systems scheduler (computing), schedule tasks for ef ...
developed by
Technical Systems Consultants (TSC) of
West Lafayette, Indiana
West Lafayette () is a city in Wabash Township, Tippecanoe County, Indiana, United States, about northwest of the state capital of Indianapolis and southeast of Chicago. West Lafayette is directly across the Wabash River from its sister ci ...
, for the
Motorola 6800
The 6800 ("''sixty-eight hundred''") is an 8-bit microprocessor designed and first manufactured by Motorola in 1974. The MC6800 microprocessor was part of the M6800 Microcomputer System (latter dubbed ''68xx'') that also included serial and paral ...
in 1976.
Overview
The original version was distributed on
8" floppy disks; the (smaller) version for 5.25" floppies is called mini-Flex. It was also later ported to the
Motorola 6809
The Motorola 6809 ("''sixty-eight-oh-nine''") is an 8-bit microprocessor with some 16-bit features. It was designed by Motorola's Terry Ritter and Joel Boney and introduced in 1978. Although source compatible with the earlier Motorola 6800, the 6 ...
; that version is called Flex09. All versions are text-based and intended for use on display devices ranging from printing terminals like the
Teletype Model 33
The Teletype Model 33 is an electromechanical teleprinter designed for light-duty office use. It is less rugged and cost less than earlier Teletype machines. The Teletype Corporation introduced the Model 33 as a commercial product in 1963 aft ...
ASR to smart terminals. While no graphic displays are supported by TSC software, some hardware supports elementary graphics and pointing devices.
FLEX is a disk-based operating system, using 256-byte sectors on soft-sectored floppies; the disk structure uses linkage bytes in each sector to indicate the next sector in a file or free list. The directory structure is simplified as a result. TSC (and others) provide several programming languages including
BASIC
BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) is a family of general-purpose, high-level programming languages designed for ease of use. The original version was created by John G. Kemeny and Thomas E. Kurtz at Dartmouth College ...
in two flavors (standard and extended) and a tokenizing version of extended BASIC called Pre-compiled BASIC,
FORTH
Forth or FORTH may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''forth'' magazine, an Internet magazine
* ''Forth'' (album), by The Verve, 2008
* ''Forth'', a 2011 album by Proto-Kaw
* Radio Forth, a group of independent local radio stations in Scotla ...
,
C,
FORTRAN, and
PASCAL.
TSC also wrote a version of FLEX, ''Smoke Signal DOS'', for the California hardware manufacturer
Smoke Signal Broadcasting
Smoke is a suspension of airborne particulates and gases emitted when a material undergoes combustion or pyrolysis, together with the quantity of air that is entrained or otherwise mixed into the mass. It is commonly an unwanted by-product ...
; this version uses forward and reverse linkage bytes in each sector which increase disk reliability at the expense of compatibility and speed.
Later, TSC introduced the
multitasking,
multi-user
Multi-user software is computer software that allows access by multiple users of a computer. Time-sharing systems are multi-user systems. Most batch processing systems for mainframe computers may also be considered "multi-user", to avoid leaving ...
,
Unix-like
A Unix-like (sometimes referred to as UN*X or *nix) operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, although not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification. A Unix-li ...
UniFLEX operating system, which requires
DMA
DMA may refer to:
Arts
* ''DMA'' (magazine), a defunct dance music magazine
* Dallas Museum of Art, an art museum in Texas, US
* Danish Music Awards, an award show held in Denmark
* BT Digital Music Awards, an annual event in the UK
* Doctor of M ...
disk controllers, 8" disk, and sold in small numbers. Several of the TSC computer languages were ported to UniFLEX.
During the early 1980s, FLEX was offered by
Compusense Ltd as an operating system for the 6809-based
Dragon 64
The Dragon 32 and Dragon 64 are home computers that were built in the 1980s. The Dragons are very similar to the TRS-80 Color Computer, and were produced for the European market by Dragon Data, Ltd., initially in Swansea, Wales before m ...
home computer.
Commands
The following
commands
Command may refer to:
Computing
* Command (computing), a statement in a computer language
* COMMAND.COM, the default operating system shell and command-line interpreter for DOS
* Command key, a modifier key on Apple Macintosh computer keyboards
* ...
are supported by different versions of the FLEX operating system.
FLEX 9.0 User’s Manual
/ref>
* APPEND
* ASN
* BACKUP
* BUILD
* CAT
* COPY
* COPYNEW
* C4MAT
* CLEAN
* DATE
* DELETE
* ECHO
In audio signal processing and acoustics, an echo is a reflection of sound that arrives at the listener with a delay after the direct sound. The delay is directly proportional to the distance of the reflecting surface from the source and the li ...
* EXEC
* FIX
* GET
* I
* JUMP
* LINK
* LIST
* MEMTEST1
* MON
* N
* NEWDISK
* O
* P
* P.COR
* PO
* PRINT
Printing is the process for reproducing text and images using a master form or template
Print or printing may also refer to:
Publishing
* Canvas print, the result of an image printed onto canvas which is often stretched, or gallery-wrapped, o ...
* PROT
* PSP
* Q
* QCHECK
* READPROM
* RENAME
Rename may refer to:
* Rename (computing), rename of a file on a computer
* RENAME (command), command to rename a file in various operating systems
* Rename (relational algebra), unary operation in relational algebra
* Company renaming, rename ...
* RM
* S
* SAVE
* SAVE.LOW
* SBOX
* SP
* STARTUP
* TOUCH
In physiology, the somatosensory system is the network of neural structures in the brain and body that produce the perception of touch ( haptic perception), as well as temperature ( thermoception), body position ( proprioception), and pain. It ...
* TTYSET
* UCAL
* USEMF
* VER
* VERIFY
* VERSION
* WRITPROM
* XOUT
* Y
See also
*Microsoft BASIC-68 for FLEX
Microsoft BASIC is the foundation software product of the Microsoft company and evolved into a line of BASIC interpreters and compiler(s) adapted for many different microcomputers. It first appeared in 1975 as Altair BASIC, which was the first ve ...
* Microsoft BASIC-69 for FLEX
References
External links
FLEX User Group
SWTPC 6800 FLEX 2 and 6809 FLEX 9 / UniFLEX / OS9 Level 1 emulator
The Missing 6809 UniFLEX Archive
DragonWiki
FLEX Software Archive
{{Disk operating systems
Discontinued operating systems
Disk operating systems
TRS-80 Color Computer
1976 software