The FLEX single-user Operating System initially released by Technical
System Consultants in 1978 was the most widely adopted operating system for
Motorola 6800 and 6809 systems. FLEX has a large catalog of applications
including: word processors, spreadsheets, general business applications,
and many editors, assemblers, tools, and programming languages. Frank Hogg
Laboratory brought FLEX to the Color computer in 1982, almost a full year
before Microware’s OS-9 came to the CoCo in 1983. FLEX was largely
forgotten in favor of the more powerful and flexible OS-9. While not
completely lost in the modern age the existing versions available in the
archives were not runnable. Today Obsolete Computer Systems is happy to
announce the General Availability of the newly restored Color Computer FLEX
5.0:4 from Frank Hogg Laboratory. These have been imaged from physical
disks in the Obsolete Comptuer Systems (MikeyN6IL) collection and restored
to formats which are usable for CoCo users in the 21st century, including:
XRoar emulator, on a real CoCo with a CoCo SDC or Floppy Drive, or even
right in your web browser!
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a. Run a FLEX Demo Right in your Web Browser! Go to:
And click on the first link “Live Demo”
b. Download the zip file from the Internet Archive:
https://archive.org/details/color-flex-5.0.4-frank-hogg-laboratory
c. Using with XRoar
Use XRoar 1.4 or later. Set up to run as a CoCo and use the DMK format
disk images. To start FLEX type:
RUN "FLEXd. Using with a CoCo SDC
Copy the SDF disk iamges to your SD Card. Use SDX or DRIVE commands to
attach the disk images. To start FLEX type:
RUN "FLEXe. Using with physical disks
Use a GreaseWeazle, FluxEngine or similar to write the SCP Flux images to
make exact copies of the disks. Both 5.25″ and Double-Density(720k) 3.5″
disks may be used. To start FLEX type:
RUN "FLEXf. Additional FLEX Software available:
https://archive.org/details/color-utilities-flex-frank-hogg-laboratory
https://archive.org/details/ed-editor-flex-frank-hogg-laboratory
https://archive.org/details/extended-6809-basic-flex-technical-systems-consultants
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While there have been disk images for FLEX floating around the interwebs
for some time, if you tried to use these images they simply would not work.
The reason why is FLEX has unique disk formatting with a Single-Density(FM)
track 0 containing 10-sectors and the rest of the tracks are
Double-Density(MFM) containing 18-sectors. Most emulators by default do
not expect this. They default to having all of the sectors of the disk
uniformly formatted with the same number of sectors on every track. When
FLEX tries to access Track 0 it fails because of this assumption.
To restore these disk images, I simply had to correct the formatting issues
and provide the disk images in useful formats which maintain the proper
formatting.
I have gone over the restoration process in detail in a YouTube Video:
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For more information please see one of my YouTube videos:
PlayList:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLKZPh42EUcynotoZhJ6Z7dN0DUDfs2OaU
MikeyN6IL’s VLOG $0D: FLEXing the CoCo Ep.1: History::
https://youtu.be/wxjyv4LzXe8
MikeyN6IL’s VLOG $0E: FLEXing the CoCo Ep.2: Editing and Assembling
https://youtu.be/XD7kG-iluwE
MikeyN6IL’s VLOG $0F: FLEXing the CoCo Ep.3: Restoration
https://youtu.be/Uj2AK9lkVe0
MikeyN6IL’s VLOG $10: FLEXing the CoCo Ep 4: Artifacts
https://youtu.be/E30y-yEvGDE
MikeyN6IL’s VLOG $11: FLEXing the CoCo Ep 5: Release
https://youtu.be/uBkrlUfA_5Q
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https://archive.org/details/color-utilities-flex-frank-hogg-laboratory
This package contains FHL Color FLEX 5.0:4 copied from a physical
floppy disk found in MikeyN6IL’s Collection.
The same disk image is provided in 3 different formats: SCP, DMK, and SDF
Note that DSK or IMA format sector images are not provided because they are
not useful on a CoCo. HxCFlopyEmulator Software or Mikey’s dmk tool can be
used to create them.
Package Contents::
fhl_flex_5_0_4.scp
The SCP image was made from a physical disk using a GreaseWeazle
fhl_flex_5_0_4.DMK
DMK conversion of above. This is usable in XRoar and Emulators.
fhl_flex_5_0_4.SDF
SDF conversion of above for the CoCoSDC
Also in this package:::
fhl_flex_5_0_4.png
Image of the original floppy disk
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https://archive.org/details/color-utilities-flex-frank-hogg-laboratory
This package contains FHL Color Utilities copied from a physical floppy
disk found in MikeyN6IL’s Collection.
The same disk image is provided in 3 different formats: SCP, DMK, and SDF
Note that DSK or IMA format sector images are not provided because they are
not useful on a CoCo. HxCFlopyEmulator Software or Mikey’s dmk tool can be
used to create them.
Package Contents::
fhl_color_utilities.scp
The SCP image was made from a physical disk using a GreaseWeazle
fhl_color_utilities.DMK
DMK conversion of above. This is usable in XRoar and Emulators.
fhl_color_utilities.SDF
SDF conversion of above for the CoCoSDC
Also in this package:::
fhl_color_utilities.png
Image of the original floppy disk
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https://archive.org/details/ed-editor-flex-frank-hogg-laboratory
This package contains FHL “ED” Editor copied from a physical floppy disk
found in MikeyN6IL’s Collection.
The same disk image is provided in 3 different formats: SCP, DMK, and SDF
Note that DSK or IMA format sector images are not provided because they are
not useful on a CoCo. HxCFlopyEmulator Software or Mikey’s dmk tool can be
used to create them.
Package Contents::
fhl_ed.scp
The SCP image was made from a physical disk using a GreaseWeazle
fhl_ed.DMK
DMK conversion of above. This is usable in XRoar and Emulators.
fhl_ed.SDF
SDF conversion of above for the CoCoSDC
Also in this package:::
fhl_ed.png
Image of the original floppy disk
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https://archive.org/details/extended-6809-basic-flex-technical-systems-consultants
This package contains TSC Extended BASIC copied from a physical
floppy disk found in MikeyN6IL’s Collection.
The same disk image is provided in 3 different formats: SCP, DMK, and SDF
Note that DSK or IMA format sector images are not provided because they are
not useful on a CoCo. HxCFlopyEmulator Software or Mikey’s dmk tool can be
used to create them.
Package Contents::
tsc_extended_basic.scp
The SCP image was made from a physical disk using a GreaseWeazle
tsc_extended_basic.DMK
DMK conversion of above. This is usable in XRoar and Emulators.
tsc_extended_basic.SDF
SDF conversion of above for the CoCoSDC
Also in this package:::
tsc_extended_basic.png
Image of the original floppy disk