Bot Bench I'd Rather Be Building Robots
I recently started getting into retro computing, and got myself a Z180-based RC2014 compatible board, the SC126. It features an SD card adapter, which you can boot from, and store files on.
On CP/M, there is a way to transfer files via the serial port, using the xmodem protocol. However, getting this to work on a Mac is not immediately obvious, at least it wasn’t to me.
Minicom on the Mac can be installed via the Homebrew system. It has some preconfigured paths for the x, y and z modem helper apps, but they aren’t installed with it. To get those, you have to install the lrzsz package from brew. They don’t have the same names as the preconfigured applications, though, so you have to make some changes to your Minicom configuration.
Open the “File Transfer Protocols” settings by hitting Meta-O to open the Minicom settings and then picking the right option. Change the paths of the binaries A through F, to the following:
You should be good to go now. Just start xm on the CP/M prompt, as usual and you’ll be able to transfer files without any issues.
