info-mac@uw-beaver (01/17/85)
From: mtu!russell@Glacier (Russell Reid)
I have a couple of notes to add to "Copying Mac Pascal". Yes,
Copy 2 Mac /MacTools (Central Point Software, 9700 S.W. Capitol Hwy,
#100, Portland Oregon, 97219 (503) 244-5782 ($39.95) *DOES*
allow you to copy Mac Pascal. But it is my experience that it does
NOT allow you to copy the copies. I have not tried this enough
times to be sure of it, but when I copy my original MacPascal disk,
the copy works fine. If I try to copy the copy, it does not work
fine.
MacTools lets you look at a disk sector by sector, verify it, and
edit the sectors. MacPascal deliberately has a damaged sector:Block
16 of all my Pascal disks has an error. (Block 16 is noted as the
"allocation start" block for the volume "pascal", whose directory
extends from blocks 4 to 15) I don't know what Pascal does with this
block, but I do know you can only bit copy it.
MacTools allows you to look at invisible files, click "protect"
and "invisible" on and off, and other things. My original Pascal
disk still works fine if the "protect" is unprotected.
Alas, what I really wanted from Copy 2 Mac/MacTools, it does not
do. I want to copy Pascal, and other important applications, onto
my hard disk. MacTools allows me to remove the protection, and copy
it to the (Tecmar) hard disk. (Unfortunately, the bit copy program
Copy 2 Mac does not know the hard disk is there). Once the Pascal
is on the hard disk, however, the charming error protection scheme
causes it to blow up (system error) if I try to use it.
We are using MacPascal for one of our pascal classes, and have
had a lot of headaches. As others have noted, it is so tiny that
you can't write much besides cute things without a fat mac. We have
been having all kinds of as-yet-unexplained and as-yet-unpreventable
problems with MacPascal. Lots of students come in with programs that
give system errors when you try to open them. The students disks
don't have Pascal on them, only their program; Pascal remains at
school. The programs print and verify OK, so the problem seems
to be with MacPascal.
Russell Reid, Michigan Technological University