Omnimaga
Omnimaga => News => Topic started by: DJ Omnimaga on March 04, 2014, 02:40:24 pm
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TI-Planet has just announced (http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13994&p=158429#p158429) that Texas Instruments have released OS 4.2, a revolutionary TI-84 Plus C Silver Edition update featuring several new astonishing features that are listed below!
Improvements over OS 4.0:
-none
Bugfixes:
-none
Changes since OS 4.0:
-None. It appears, though, that TI-Testguard was also updated to 4.2, which is probably an indication that this OS is slightly enhanced on the exam security side. Yet another good sign that Texas Instruments care a lot about the TI programmer community!
TI-Planet news (http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13994&p=158429#p158429) have more info on this revolutionary OS update, and hopefully Texas Instruments shares more details soon, such as a change log of the many new features this OS comes with!
OS 4.2: The higher the version number, the better!
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Lol, so do we have any reason to update?
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This piece of news should go brown text. :P
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Silly TI. So absolutely nothing happened between 4.0 and 4.2? Oh wow.
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Chances are that 4.2 has new bugs or incompatibilities.
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This piece of news should go brown text. :P
It's quite real, though. http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition (http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition) Version 4.2 as of February 27. (So we're a bit late on finding this out ;) )
Someone ought to diff the two versions and see what's changed. (Presumably something has)
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This piece of news should go brown text. :P
It's quite real, though. http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition (http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition) Version 4.2 as of February 27. (So we're a bit late on finding this out ;) )
Someone ought to diff the two versions and see what's changed. (Presumably something has)
I'm calling it now, it's just the version number and the RSA signature.
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This piece of news should go brown text. :P
It's quite real, though. http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition (http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition) Version 4.2 as of February 27. (So we're a bit late on finding this out ;) )
Someone ought to diff the two versions and see what's changed. (Presumably something has)
Actually if you check the TI-Planet news, the OS actually dates from January 17th 2014: http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=158429&sid=cbb899eeeb45c6d1e80437da2d493bf2#p158429
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This is really weird. Why such a large jump in version number if virtually nothing changed? ??? Why not update it to version 4.0x instead of 4.2?
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Not sure. I think they are joining the Firefox/Chrome/Opera bandwagon. :P
The new software version motto is The higher the number: The Better! :P
This piece of news should go brown text. :P
Thanks for the idea. At first I was hesitant to turn it brown since this is actually real, but since it's funny I have now decided to do it anyway. :P
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Thanks for the news and source. :)
This piece of news should go brown text. :P
It's quite real, though. http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition (http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition) Version 4.2 as of February 27. (So we're a bit late on finding this out ;) )
The date indicated on TI website is neither the date the new file did appear on TI webpage (only yesterday) nor the build date which is internally set to January 17th 2014.
It might be the date the file was validated for release. So they took something like a month to test and validate the file, and then some days to update the page.
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This piece of news should go brown text. :P
It's quite real, though. http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition (http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition) Version 4.2 as of February 27. (So we're a bit late on finding this out ;) )
Someone ought to diff the two versions and see what's changed. (Presumably something has)
I'm calling it now, it's just the version number and the RSA signature.
So literally nothing changed ?
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Thanks for the news and source. :)
This piece of news should go brown text. :P
It's quite real, though. http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition (http://education.ti.com/en/us/software/search/ti-84-plus-c-silver-edition) Version 4.2 as of February 27. (So we're a bit late on finding this out ;) )
The date indicated on TI website is neither the date the new file did appear on TI webpage (only yesterday) nor the build date which is internally set to January 17th 2014.
It might be the date the file was validated for release. So they took something like a month to test and validate the file, and then some days to update the page.
They test their releases? O.O
Or maybe it was finished over a month ago but they were just too lazy to bother putting it online, or they just spend so much time trying to lock Ndless that they forgot. :P
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I'm calling it now, it's just the version number and the RSA signature.
So literally nothing changed ?
We don't know yet. calc84 is just being incredibly pessimistic :P
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I'm calling it now, it's just the version number and the RSA signature.
So literally nothing changed ?
We don't know yet. calc84 is just being incredibly pessimistic :P
Well actually, given TI's track record recently with OS updates this may be a form of optimism. :P
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critor posted a screenshot (http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13994&p=158429#p158480) on TI-Planet comparing the two and it seems there are quite a few changes, though in the lines visible on-screen most of them are things like "C39417" to "C39717" and "CD983F" to "CDA13F". Maybe they inserted a jump somewhere and had to update the rest of the addresses?
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Wow, that are a lot of changes.
Maybe they put in some bugs on extra. Maybe they are just screwing around with hidden "features" :P
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critor posted a screenshot (http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13994&p=158429#p158480) on TI-Planet comparing the two and it seems there are quite a few changes, though in the lines visible on-screen most of them are things like "C39417" to "C39717" and "CD983F" to "CDA13F". Maybe they inserted a jump somewhere and had to update the rest of the addresses?
Could this address change cause some ASM programs to stop working?
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critor posted a screenshot (http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13994&p=158429#p158480) on TI-Planet comparing the two and it seems there are quite a few changes, though in the lines visible on-screen most of them are things like "C39417" to "C39717" and "CD983F" to "CDA13F". Maybe they inserted a jump somewhere and had to update the rest of the addresses?
Could this address change cause some ASM programs to stop working?
Nope, those are internal OS calls.
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You've also got to keep in mind that adding one instruction at the beginning will offset all the other labels that follow it, so every jp and call that points to an address after it will be affected. As you can see, most of the changes are jumps/calls that only change their address by a few bytes. I'm not sure how the OS is set up, maybe they've got a jump table and have added a couple new routines? Anyway, as calc84 said, those jumps all point to the $0000-$3FFF range which is for the OS and won't affect (most) programs. The bcall table is in $4000-$7FFF, but i doubt they would change those addresses around.
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BrandonW concluded that all changes were TestGuard-related. Specifically, TI has added significant code to TestGuard to detect OS patches; apparently, we are not allowed to patch the OS. Sorry, thepenguin. Anyway, it will show an ominous error big (non-red, oddly) X with an error message saying that there's an error 42 and that you should contact TI for more information. Maybe they'll tell the teacher that the student is a big cheater and should be hanged at dawn. Or maybe they'll just say to resend the OS.
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I wish that TI did something like this for the TI-Nspire but more secure, in order to detect if your calc has nLaunch/Ndless installed, rather than totally locking down the calc so no ASM/C is possible.
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BrandonW concluded that all changes were TestGuard-related. Specifically, TI has added significant code to TestGuard to detect OS patches; apparently, we are not allowed to patch the OS. Sorry, thepenguin. Anyway, it will show an ominous error big (non-red, oddly) X with an error message saying that there's an error 42 and that you should contact TI for more information. Maybe they'll tell the teacher that the student is a big cheater and should be hanged at dawn. Or maybe they'll just say to resend the OS.
So basically, if we fix their screw ups with a patch, it'll flag it as an error. Lolwut. That's pretty stupid , as there are much easier ways to cheat than using an OS patch...
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I wish that TI did something like this for the TI-Nspire but more secure, in order to detect if your calc has nLaunch/Ndless installed, rather than totally locking down the calc so no ASM/C is possible.
Well that's basically like saying "Man I wish it were easier to get crakin' on that Ndless 3.6..." :P
I was really hoping these "new routines" might speed some stuff up on this slow OS. Apparently they just have an error code for color-blind people who go wayyy over the top to cheat on tests.
As our lolwut Art_of_camelot friend pointed out, people don't usually use patches anyway. I've NEVER used an OS patch for cheating (but I have used other methods :P ) Most of the patches that exist for other calcs are just for convenience and for ease of use by programmers. Just things that make it easier to write the unwashed masses more games. The only patch that could maybe be used for cheating would be an app similar to Omnicalc + Symbolic, but it's not even a patch as it is: It just adds some hooks, which just/must reside only in memory. Lots of my friends have made le swtich to CSE, but most people still use the monochrome beasties. zStart is the holy grail of applications in my opinion, becuase I don't have to run Omnicalc again everytime I get a RAM clear on an unstable OS with low battery. :P zStart barely counts, anyway. It's mostly hooks, aside from the major boot mod that it can optionally perform. My friends didn't install zStart to mod their OSs because they were too scared about bricking it when I told them what boot-code and certificates were. :P
So they pretty much did nothing that mattered, anyway. Typical TI. ;P
Besides, most teachers in my experience don't go to that much trouble to check for stuff. My teachers had an assembly line for about 250 students to check the calcs only for the model number. They didn't even open the case. They just labeled a TI Nspire CX (non-cas) as illegal out of their own laziness. That is, until you objected and stood your ground. TI should just write an OS which is much harder to cheat using. Scrap it and redo, bros!
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They didn't even open the case.
Two words: case swapping. (The TI-89T PCB fits in the TI-84+ case.)
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Hmm, I wonder what this means for TI-Boy CSE. It's not like the execution of TI-Boy itself makes any permanent changes to the OS, except it patches an OS glitch with flash page copying which would occasionally corrupt apps. Technically I could leave out that patch and TI-Boy would run fine, but then some apps would occasionally get corrupted when being moved during defragmentation.
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. . . an OS glitch with flash page copying which would occasionally corrupt apps. . . . some apps would occasionally get corrupted when being moved during defragmentation.
I'm familiar with the BAD ADDRESS bug, but I've not heard of this one. So apparently, you get random corruption with both apps and the archive. What's the fix?
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i know my CSE quite well. what has changed is this:
if programs you want to group are in the ARC, it won't show in the possible prgms to select to group.
(really handy for me, because i often group alota stuff)
TI-boy 0.03 works.
Doors CSE 8.0 still works.
if you are going to group programs, make sure the ones you wanna group are in the RAM. otherwise, they WON'T show up.
;)
that's all i have noticed so far!
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What I don't get is after all those years, why can't the 84+ OSes run programs from archive the way Doors CS does yet? It's like if they tried to keep the RAM as low as possible to lure people towards the TI-Nspire CX
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What I don't get is after all those years, why can't the 84+ OSes run programs from archive the way Doors CS does yet? It's like if they tried to keep the RAM as low as possible to lure people towards the TI-Nspire CX
agreed. how could they try to make us pay more money? Are they more focused on us students, or their $$$? TI make up your mind, but you better chose the students!
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The transition is more from 68k to Nspire.
If they wanted to push all z80ers to Nspires, they wouldn't have spent time&money making the 84C :P
Anyway, I don't know why they don't allow programs to be running from ARC. Maybe there can be some technical issues ? I really don't know anyway, that's not my area :P
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Thankfully we have Doors CS and stuff at least, but on the 84+ we can't edit archived programs from DCS unless we quit from them then use Goto.
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speaking of doors cse, have they released a new update?
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Not yet. I didn't have any problem with the app so far, though.