will1990@dunkirk.DKK (The phone Cops) (04/30/89)
I have a simple wish for 1.4. Have the Diskcopy(workbench util.) use the Optimum amount of memory when copying to reduce the amount of Disk switches. I have seen this on the Marauder Program... With one Meg it'll read up to the 55th Cylinder. After about 5 copies, you hate every switch. -mike
limonce@pilot.njin.net (Tom Limoncelli) (04/30/89)
I've been trying to avoid posting "In 1.4 I want to see..." but this
last request got me thinking.
When a disk is formatted, the sectors mostly store zeros... right?
Couldn't diskcopy require less memory and do fewer swaps if it took
advantage of this? Right now it takes the same number of swaps to
copy a blank disk as it did to copy a full disk.
That kind of compression scheme isn't anything that couldn't be
written in a day. So why not? Well, one-drive copies are no longer
the norm and tons of memory is going to be the norm. But actually,
with a hard drive many people only have one 3.5" drive and I'm the
kind of person that always wants each program to use the minimum RAM.
(I guess that happens when your first programming experience was on a
5K VIC-20!)
Of course, another option would be to have an option that would say,
"use xxx as swap space" so that you could use DH0:, etc as swap.
Just a suggestion,
Tom
--
Tom Limoncelli -- tlimonce@drunivac.Bitnet -- limonce@pilot.njin.net
Drew University -- Box 1060, Madison, NJ -- 201-408-5389
Standard Disclaimer: I am not the mouth-piece of Drew University