French AZERTY keyboard driver for Montezuma Micro CP/M on TRS-80 Model 4/4p
This driver allows the users of a TRS-80 Model 4/4p with an AZERTY keyboard to easily use the MM CP/M operating system without having to remember the QWERTY keyboard layout.
For a Montezuma Micro CP/M v2.2 system with BIOS version 2.22, build kbfr222
.
For a Montezuma Micro CP/M v2.2 system with BIOS version 2.30+, build kbfr230
.
The source files are located in the folder keybfr
.
You'll need to first copy zmac.exe
from George Phillips
into the subfolder keybfr\zmac
.
Then, depending on your CP/M version, run a_kbfr222.bat
or a_kbfr230.bat
.
This will create the driver binary file KBFR222.COM
or KBFR230.COM
.
Copy or transfer the binary file to a copy of your CP/M system diskette.
Then insert the CP/M diskette into the TRS-80 drive A: and boot the system.
On CP/M 2.22 type KBFR222
followed by <ENTER>
. On CP/M 2.30+ type KBFR230
followed by <ENTER>
.
This will load and activate the AZERTY keyboard driver. This driver doesn't take additional
memory, as it directly patches the BIOS.
It is possible to SYSGEN the driver so it is immediatly loaded at boot time. To do this
(replace nnn
with either 222
or 230
depending on your CP/M version):
- type
KBFRnnn *
: this will load the driver and prepare it for a SYSGEN; - type
SYSGEN
and follow the instructions to re-write the system to the disk in drive A:.
A>KBFR222
French keyboard driver 1.00
for BIOS rel. 2.22
Ready for "SYSGEN"
A>SYSGEN
In SYSGEN type <ENTER>
A
<ENTER>
<ENTER>
.
When the system is rebooted, the welcome message looks shorter (because we needed to borrow some bytes from the welcome message in the BIOS for the AZERTY keyboard translation):
64k CP/M 2.2
BIOS r2.22Fr (c)'84 MM/JBO
To restore the original CP/M BIOS with the QWERTY driver, issue the following commands:
A>MOVCPM 64 *
CONSTRUCTING 64k CP/M vers 2.2
READY FOR "SYSGEN' OR
"SAVE 44 CPM64.COM"
A>SYSGEN
In SYSGEN type <ENTER>
A
<ENTER>
<ENTER>
.
-
The AZERTY keyboard layout is somewhat different from the layout in TRSDOS/LS-DOS. CP/M is unable to handle accented characters because it is limited to 7-bit ASCII. So the accented characters é, è, à, ç, § and SHIFT-¨ are replaced respectly with [, ], `, ^, # and ~. Also the keys ^ and ¨ are no 'dead keys'. The
CLEAR
key generates ESC (0x1B) andSHIFT
-CLEAR
clears the command line.CTRL
-CLEAR
generates DEL (0x7F). -
The AZERTY keyboard driver can be SYSGENed to a bootable CP/M hard disk. Just add it as the first command in the HDBOOT.SUB file:
KBFR230 EXBIOS CPMFIX HDRS15M H0=AB H1=CD F=EFGH