Topic       : The ATARI Compendium
Author      : Scott Sanders / JAY Software
Version     : 1.25 (20/6/2003)
Subject     : Documentation
Nodes       : 1117
Index Size  : 32614
HCP-Version : 6
Compiled on : Atari
@charset    : UTF-8
@lang       : en
@default    : 
@help       : %About
@options    : +g -i -t4 +y +z
@width      : 100
View Ref-File                                                                    C04
                                   XBIOS


The eXtended Basic Input/Output System (XBIOS) is a software sub-system
of TOS which contains functions used to interact with and control Atari
computer hardware. The availability of many of these functions is
dependent on hardware whose presence can be determined by the current TOS
version or by interrogating the system 'cookie jar' (see Chapter 3: BIOS
for more details).

Some functions (notably video hardware and storage device related
functions) should only be used by device drivers and system level software
as they represent a non-portable method of hardware interaction which may
be unsupported in future Atari computers.

As a general rule, GEMDOS and VDI functions should be used, when
possible, rather than XBIOS calls. The GEMDOS and VDI provide a software
abstraction layer which will make software applications much more
compatible across new computer releases.


   ∙ Video Control
   ∙ The Falcon030 Sound System
   ∙ The DSP
   ∙ User/Supervisor Mode
   ∙ MetaDOS
   ∙ Keyboard and Mouse Control
   ∙ Disk Functions
   ∙ The Serial Port
   ∙ Printer Control
   ∙ Other XBIOS Functions
   ∙ XBIOS Function Calling Procedure
   ∙ XBIOS Function Reference