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tools/

Tooling for the NDInsight SINTRAN III reverse-engineering effort.

Subfolder What it is
sintran-segment-carver/ The SINTRAN carver and all carved data. Cuts the individual SINTRAN pieces (paged system segments + memory-resident code/data) out of a raw SINTRAN III SMD disk image into per-piece big-endian .bin files at their correct load addresses, for disassembly (nd100-dis) or Ghidra. Also holds the reverse-engineering tree (MON-call analysis, ND-500 system monitor, segment references). See sintran-segment-carver/README.md.
boot-floppy/ The ND distribution diskettes, disc boot sectors, and how SINTRAN is generated onto a disc. Works from the original ND distribution floppies and from page 0 of real installed packs — the shipped systems before installation, and the boot code an installed system writes for itself. Answers how a system is installed (large disc and SCSI), what disc geometries/sizes are supported, how the disc boot sector is authored and structured, what MACM's install dialogue does, and how SINTRAN patches work. The complementary witness to the carver: floppies = as-shipped, carver = installed-and-patched. See boot-floppy/README.md.

Where the carved data lives

The carved bytes are under sintran-segment-carver/versions/<VER>/, one subfolder per SINTRAN version (L-VSX-500/ = L07, K-VSX-500/ = K05, M-VSX-500/ = M06). L-VSX-500/ is the primary, fullest set and the folder to read from / extend for L07 work - see sintran-segment-carver/versions/L-VSX-500/README.md.

How the carving works / how to extend it

  • sintran-segment-carver/EXTRACTING-SEGMENTS.md - the paged system segments (the reconcile.py -> carve.py pipeline; how to carve a new version or re-carve).
  • sintran-segment-carver/EXTRACTING-RESIDENT-CODE.md - the memory-resident code/data the segment carver cannot produce (raw NDFS block extraction; PIT-overlay resolution; live-DAP capture).

Everything stays under E:\Dev\Ronny\NDInsight\. The status-of-record docs the carving updates are ../SINTRAN/CARVING-HANDOFF.md (ND-100) and ../SINTRAN/ND500/ND500-STATUS-AND-INDEX.md (ND-500).

The two are complementary — read them together

The carver and boot-floppy/ are independent witnesses to the same systems.

  • sintran-segment-carver/ = an installed, running, site-patched SINTRAN, carved off a hard disk. Ground truth for what the kernel is at runtime.
  • boot-floppy/ = the same systems as ND shipped them (distribution floppies) plus page 0 of real packs. Ground truth for how a system is generated onto a disc and how it boots.

Where they disagree, the disagreement is information — e.g. the disc-geometry table lives in the carved DPIT segment (not S3FS); the boot sector is written by the running kernel at cold-start (not shipped, not by MACM); and the disc-type numbering splits into three distinct axes (MACM MSTYP, kernel SWTYP, page-0 YSWTY). Two skills, nd-disc-boot and sintran-generation, distil the boot-floppy/ findings; sintran-carving covers the carver.