NEC PC-9800 Quick Guide

Nihongo Microsoft®Windows

Microsoft Windows provides the application developer with a device independent platform. The differences between IBM-PC and the PC-9800 under Windows are few. Many English language Windows applications will execute unchanged under Nippongo Windows on the PC-9800. Some common problems can occur due to the fact that the standard character fonts are typically larger than English fonts. This leads to character positioning problems if the Windows application does not fully use font metrics.

In general, Windows provides an excellent platform for the software developer to target with minimal changes for country specific hardware. While existing DOS applications are difficult to convert to the Windows environment, new development should give strong consideration to the Windows platform. The same benefits apply to applications running under OS/2 PM and UNIX.

Character Encoding

The Windows ANSI character set is not constant across all Windows platforms. Under English Windows the ANSI encoding for ©and ®are 0xA9 and 0xAE. However, under Japanese Windows, these characters appear as '' and '' respectively. The Windows &153; character does not appear in Japanese Windows. Have your translator use three single byte letters "(C)" and "(R)" to represent these symbols. You can get the installed Windows system language and sub-language ID by using the VERSIONINFO tools on user.exe or gdi.exe.

Fonts

Fonts such as Helv, TmsRmn, MS Sans Serif, and Arial may be installed on a Japanese Windows platform, but they cannot display Japanese text. Therefore, if you hardcode Helv into your dialog boxes, the Japanese translation will appear as rectangular blocks and gibberish. Use System font whenever possible.

Entering Japanese Text

The Asian language versions of Microsoft Windows have an interface called an IME (Input Method Editor). This is the Windows equivalent of the FEP in DOS. When the keyboard is in its standard mode, pressing the key labeled A results in messages being sent to your application indicating that the keyboard letter A has been pressed. In order to choose one of the several thousand Japanese Kanji characters, the user presses the IME hotkey or key combination. This puts the keyboard into a mode where the user can press a few keys and a menu of Kanji characters will appear. The user can then select the Kanji character they want to write.

In general, your application does not need to know anything about the IME or how the user is entering characters. You simply get the string back from the standard Windows EDIT control. If you are creating your own controls or you have a high end word processing application, you may need to interface to the IME. This is a standardized DLL interface. The function prototypes are in the SDK for Asian countries and in the Far East SDK available from Microsoft in the United States.

Drive Letters

On the IBM PC the first floppy disk is always the A: device. This is not true of the NEC PC-9800 machine. The A: device is the first drive of the type that the user booted from. If the user boots from floppy, then the first floppy will be A:. However, if the user boots from the hard disk, as is normally the case, the first hard disk partition becomes the A: device. The CDROM device will have the drive letter after floppy disks or after the LASTDRIVE setting in CONFIG.SYS.

Booting from the hard disk on a drive with one partition results in:

A: hard disk
B: first floppy
C: second floppy

If the user has three hard disk partitions, two floppies, and a CDROM and boots from one of the hard disk partitions, that will result in a configuration of::

A: hard disk
B: hard disk
C: hard disk
D: floppy disk
E: floppy disk
F: CDROM

The Windows API provides GetDriveType() which should be used to determine whether the drive is a floppy, hard disk, or network disk. This is frequently needed for installation programs.

RULE: Do not assume that A: is a floppy and that C: is a hard disk.

Dialog Box Units

Be prepared for dialog size changes due to character size changes. Japanese Windows allows the user to select the System font size. The size selections available include 12, 16, 20, and 24 dots depending on the video driver in use. Avoid hard coding point sizes in dialogs when possible. Because the user may have installed Windows with either a 12 dot or 16 dot system font, your dialog may not look good on a machine with the other configuration. Test your dialog boxes on all configurations.

CLOCK Reserved Word

In addition to AUX, CON, PRN, and NUL, CLOCK is also a system reserved word.

Direct Hardware Access

Because most Japanese Windows platforms, including the NEC PC-9800 Series, are not IBM PC compatible, you must not touch any hardware directly. Most Windows applications have no need to touch hardware directly. If you do, it will fail. The PC-9800 does not use an 8250 serial UART. The serial port controller is an 8251A compatible device, but is it not at 0x3F8 or 0x2F8. The PC-9800 uses an 8255 to control the parallel port, but it is not at the address stored in 40:8. None of the 40:0 memory you used on the IBM PC is the same on the PC-9800. Do not look at 40:0

RULE: Do not access hardware directly

RULE: Install program should be Windows.

API Compatibility

The Japanese Windows API has all of the documented APIs available under US Windows and some additions. The most significant and language specific is the IME interface.

System Font Sizes

During Installation the user may choose the size of the SYSTEM font. This is especially useful on normal mode 640x400 machines where a smaller system font will get more information on the display. The PC-9800 series offers the following system font sizes. This is subject to change in future releases.

types of system fonts	selecting during Setup	resolution(dpl)	accent	accent +decent
SYSTEM	12 16(N/H) 20 24	96 96 120 120	12 16 20 24	14 18 21 27
FIXEDSYS	12 16(N/H) 20 24	96 96 120 120	12 16 20 24	14 18 21 27
Terminal	12 16(N/H) 20 24	96 96 120 120	12 16 20 24	14 16 21 26

Differences in TrueType Fonts

The TrueType font file format contains extensions for supporting Japanese character sets as described in the Microsoft TrueType font file format document. This document is available from Microsoft on the MSDN CD. The basic extensions include:

1. Supports fonts used for vertical writing.
2. Supports small point size bitmap fonts.
3. Supports user defined fonts.
4. Expands the definition of the font family and its pitches.

IME Interface

The IME interface has additional APIs added from Windows 3.0 to 3.1. The IME interface and function prototypes are documented on the Microsoft Far East SDK which is available from Microsoft US. This is part of the MSDN Level II CD package.

Additional APIs for Creating PC-9800 Applications

Mappings of GetKeyboardType() and virtual keys are different. The following describes the GetKeyboardType() function.

There is no function call to identify that you are running under NEC Windows or DOS/V Windows. GetKeyboardType() is the only function that may be used to identify the machine Windows is running on.