ralph@lzfme.UUCP (R.BRANDI) (12/02/87)
In catching up with the past week or two of comp.sys.mac, I've
noticed a lot of grumbling about the brain-damaged way Installer
works. You'll certainly get no argument from me on that count; the
first time I tried to update with Installer, I got caught in the
same disk-swap dance. But I did find a way around it. One
catch--you need to have at least a meg of memory so you can fit the
system in a RAM disk.
The computer here is a Mac Plus, upgraded over time from a 128 that
we got used a while back. The external drive is a single-sided 400K
drive (why do I have a Mac Plus and no Hard Drive, you ask? Well,
there's the driveway that needs to be replaced, and the new stove
that's needed, and the deck we replaced this summer, and...you get
the idea). Anyways, what I did was to take a 4.1/5.5 startup disk,
and run a RAM disk program (RAMStart 1.3, to be exact) which
transfers all the system files to the RAM disk. The disk I set up
was about 650K. I probably could have gotten away with about 100K
less, but not much less than that (ergo, the need for one meg...).
Running Installer from one of the Apple release disks (reconstructed
from some on-line documentation I found on one of the services--
Compu$erve, I think) transfers control to that disk (the one
Installer is on), and allows you to update the system on the RAM
disk. Voila. All you have to do is copy the contents of the RAM
disk onto your startup disk. You have to do this by selecting all
the files, rather than dragging the whole RAM disk onto a disk--
when I tried that, the System was renamed copy of System, and
resolutely refused to be renamed. Anyways, by paring down to the
absolute minimum (system-necessary fonts only, 3 DAs, including
Control Panel, Chooser and Alarm Clock, no printer driver), I was
able to fit a functional MultiFinder startup system onto a 400K
disk, which was the point of doing this. The system is now only
(ONLY???) 203K. Without using the Installer, I wouldn't have been
able to fit this all onto a 400K disk (I wouldn't know what
resources to delete with ResEdit). Now if only I could get rid of
that Option-Command-Click About MultiFinder box--it's cute the first
time, but I really don't need it on a 400K disk....
I hope this helps. I realize that it's only useful under a certain
limited set of circumstances, but it's good to know that there IS a
way to get around some things....
Ralph
==== | Disclaimer: Just `cuz I work on the Death Star,
==OOO===== | that doesn't mean I speak for Darth Vader...
=OOOOOOO==== | Ralph Brandi, {ihnp4, all AT&T machines... }!lzfme!ralph
=OOOOOOO==== | Kopykat (k) 1987, R.A.Brandi rutgers!mtune!/
==OOO===== | All Rights Reserved, All Jams Preserved,
==== | All Nasty Comments Soundly Deserved...
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