lumpkin@nas.nasa.gov (Forrest E. Lumpkin) (03/07/91)
1) Will A/UX 2.0.1 resolve the problem( undocumented feature:-) ) of only one Mac partition per physical device (hard drive)? 2) Will the bugs in the installation software be resolved. With the present software intelligent use of dp is required unless one is setting up a one A/UX partition (/) hard disk arrangement? 3) When will A/UX 2.0.1 be available? What is the planned upgrade policy? 4) Finally, does anyone know what Apple's policy is on upgrading manuals. We have the 1.1 manuals (user kit, administrator kit, sys admin kit)? Dr. Forrest E. Lumpkin III Computational Aerothermodyamics NASA Ames Research Center Mountain View, CA email: lumpkin@corvus.arc.nasa.gov
ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) (03/08/91)
[Ok, I'll try to answer some of these questions...] In article <1991Mar6.181713.5362@nas.nasa.gov> lumpkin@amelia.nas.nasa.gov (Forrest E. Lumpkin) writes: > >1) Will A/UX 2.0.1 resolve the problem( undocumented feature:-) ) > of only one Mac partition per physical device (hard drive)? Well, the trick with patching _HFSDispatch in order to fake multiple HFS volumes on one single volume has always been a hack, and thus is not suppored by neither A/UX or MacOS. >2) Will the bugs in the installation software be resolved. With the present > software intelligent use of dp is required unless one is setting up > a one A/UX partition (/) hard disk arrangement? This is a scary area, where the installation program can't guess all the possible arrangements that the administrator would wish to have. I've tested both CMS and Silverlining for A/UX disk partitioning, and even if their interfaces are bizarre, they do their job quite well. In some cases, like using LaCie hard disks, you have to use the specific disk partition program in order to download the right hard disk drivers. Otherwise HD Setup with Apple harddisks asks for a rich set of possible A/UX setups before the installation. The installation software is quite different compared with the old A/UX 1.1 installation program. >3) When will A/UX 2.0.1 be available? What is the planned upgrade policy? >4) Finally, does anyone know what Apple's policy is on upgrading manuals. > We have the 1.1 manuals (user kit, administrator kit, sys admin kit)? Sorry, I'm a network object hacker, not a marketing/sales being, so I don't know a good answer to those questions. Regards, Kent -- Kent Sandvik, Apple Computer Inc, Developer Technical Support NET:ksand@apple.com, AppleLink: KSAND DISCLAIMER: Private mumbo-jumbo Zippy++ says: "C++ was given to mankind, so that we might learn patience"
gf0c+@andrew.cmu.edu (Gregory S. Fox) (03/09/91)
Kent Sandvik writes: > I've tested both CMS and Silverlining for A/UX disk partitioning, and even > if their interfaces are bizarre, they do their job quite well. > In some cases, like using LaCie hard disks, you have to use the specific > disk partition program in order to download the right hard disk drivers. I've installed A/UX on a Cirrus 200 partitioned with Silverlining. From some of the problems I've encountered, I thought the difficulty was with the A/UX generic driver. Can you provide any more info on Silverlining/LaCie drives. --Greg
alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) (03/11/91)
In article <50005@apple.Apple.COM> ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) writes: >In article <1991Mar6.181713.5362@nas.nasa.gov> lumpkin@amelia.nas.nasa.gov (Forrest E. Lumpkin) writes: >>1) Will A/UX 2.0.1 resolve the problem( undocumented feature:-) ) >> of only one Mac partition per physical device (hard drive)? > >Well, the trick with patching _HFSDispatch in order to fake multiple >HFS volumes on one single volume has always been a hack, and thus >is not suppored by neither A/UX or MacOS. Please. It works. Thousands of people use it, and you should support it. No debate is permissible on this subject. :-) >>2) Will the bugs in the installation software be resolved. With the present >> software intelligent use of dp is required unless one is setting up >> a one A/UX partition (/) hard disk arrangement? > >This is a scary area, where the installation program can't guess >all the possible arrangements that the administrator would wish >to have. I've tested both CMS and Silverlining for A/UX disk >partitioning, and even if their interfaces are bizarre, they do >their job quite well. MicroNet's installer works best. Problem is, you can only get it with their drives. (Which are worth the money, but that's a different issue.) >Otherwise HD Setup with Apple harddisks asks for a rich set of >possible A/UX setups before the installation. The installation >software is quite different compared with the old A/UX 1.1 >installation program. This is the real problem. It is disgraceful that HD Setup won't partition 3rd party drives. I wouldn't mind if it could put drivers on them too, but that's not so critical. But Apple refuses to sell reasonably large disks, and sticks us with the archaic and arcane dp. I was under the strong impression that this was going to change in 2.0.1, but if I did hear such a commitment, it wasn't kept. What happened to "easy to use" and "great user interface"? This whole thing makes me angry because Apple has already done the work. All it would take to make HD Setup work would be the deletion of a few lines of code. --- Alexis Rosen Owner/Sysadmin, PANIX Public Access Unix, NY {cmcl2,apple}!panix!alexis
urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs) (03/11/91)
In comp.unix.aux, article <50005@apple.Apple.COM>, ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) writes: < In article <1991Mar6.181713.5362@nas.nasa.gov> lumpkin@amelia.nas.nasa.gov (Forrest E. Lumpkin) writes: < > < >1) Will A/UX 2.0.1 resolve the problem( undocumented feature:-) ) < > of only one Mac partition per physical device (hard drive)? < < Well, the trick with patching _HFSDispatch in order to fake multiple < HFS volumes on one single volume has always been a hack, and thus < is not suppored by neither A/UX or MacOS. < ??? Nobody is patching _HFSDispatch here. We're talking about multiple _physical_ partitions. All such a partition needs is an entry in the MacOS drive queue and an update to the A/UX disk driver (".AUXHFSx", for x = 0..7 -- though why there's a driver for ID 7 is beyond me to recognize more than one MacOS partition on any given SCSI device. Lots of MacOS SCSI drivers do this, and there's no hackery involved. All you have to do is continue looking at the partition map beyond the first MacOS partition found. -- Matthias Urlichs -- urlichs@smurf.sub.org -- urlichs@smurf.ira.uka.de /(o\ Humboldtstrasse 7 - 7500 Karlsruhe 1 - FRG -- +49-721-621127(0700-2330) \o)/
ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) (03/12/91)
In article <kbpvp8200UhBE1XgBI@andrew.cmu.edu> gf0c+@andrew.cmu.edu (Gregory S. Fox) writes: >Kent Sandvik writes: > >> I've tested both CMS and Silverlining for A/UX disk partitioning, and even >> if their interfaces are bizarre, they do their job quite well. > >> In some cases, like using LaCie hard disks, you have to use the specific >> disk partition program in order to download the right hard disk drivers. > > I've installed A/UX on a Cirrus 200 partitioned with Silverlining. From >some of the problems I've encountered, I thought the difficulty was with the >A/UX generic driver. Can you provide any more info on Silverlining/LaCie >drives. Sorry, there's a place for a clarification. Last week we tried to install A/UX on one of those cute LaCie 165MB hard disks. The normal trick of just dumping over the stuff (dd) resulted in bizarre behaviour, the root partition worked OK, while the second partition (from the original disk) did not work at all with the A/UX dev driver (complaining about 0x21 unsupported call). Now we were short of time, so what we did was to partition the disk with Silverlining, downloading the partition map from this program. After that we dd:ed the root disk, and just to be secure we newfs and cpio:ed the other partition. And behold, now it worked perfectly. I'm not sure yet what was the original problem, eventually something that the SilverLining partition program reprograms in the Hard disk (disables some SCSI modes...). It also seems like there's a sanity check somewhere in the drivers or the kernel, so one of the partitions could be mounted during startup, while when the other was mounted it started to scream. I have to look into this (later after I've finished a couple of hundreds of hours of MacApp work). Kent -- Disclaimer: Private and personal activities on USENET, non-company sponsored
jms@apple.com (John Michael Sovereign) (03/12/91)
In article <1991Mar6.181713.5362@nas.nasa.gov> lumpkin@nas.nasa.gov (Forrest E. Lumpkin) writes: > 3) When will A/UX 2.0.1 be available? What is the planned upgrade policy? CUPERTINO, California--March 11, 1991--Apple Computer, Inc. announced today the pricing and immediate availability of A/UX 2.0.1, its latest version of the UNIX operating system, which now supports the Macintosh IIsi. A/UX 2.0.1 provides customers of the Macintosh SE/30 and all Macintosh II class computers access to the familiar, intuitive Macintosh computer desktop and productivity applications, within the industry-standard UNIX environment.Because A/UX 2.0.1 now supports the low cost Macintosh IIsi and includes MacX 1.1 (an X Window display server), customers can have a lower cost UNIX system with access to X applications. Additionally, A/UX allows customers to have a single system on their desk to do all their daily work including mixing and matching UNIX, X Window System and Macintosh applications. They can also run MS-DOS applications using SoftPC from I nsignia Software. A/UX is available immediately from all authorized A/UX resellers in various media configurations for the following manufacturer's suggested retail prices: A/UX 2.0.1 on CD ROM $795 A/UX 2.0.1 on Floppy Disks $995 Macintosh IIfx 4MB/160HD $9269 Macintosh IIfx 8MB/160HD $9669 Macintosh IIci 8MB/80HD $6869 Macintosh IIsi 5MB/80HD $5169 (includes NuBus Adapter Card) (The above systems ship configured with A/UX 2.0.1 preinstalled on the internal hard disk.) A/UX 2.0.1 Incremental Kit (for v2.0) $175 A/UX 2.0.1 Update CD ROM (for v1.x) $275
cruff@ncar.ucar.edu (Craig Ruff) (03/13/91)
Having seen the announcement for 2.0.1 that supports the IIsi, I am considering spending some of my tax refund on A/UX. However, I have several questions. 1) Are AppleTalk laser printers supported via the printer port? I don't want to buy any extra cards... 2) How much usable space is available on a 160 Mb drive? I assume I can always remove unused stuff I don't need. 3) What 3rd party disks have support for A/UX partitions and drivers? 4) I guess that MacOS HFS drives (partitions) are mountable under A/UX. True? 5) Who do I call to find the anointed A/UX dealers in my area? Thanks in advance... -- Craig Ruff NCAR cruff@ncar.ucar.edu (303) 497-1211 P.O. Box 3000 Boulder, CO 80307
urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs) (03/13/91)
In comp.unix.aux, article <50137@apple.Apple.COM>, ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) writes: < < In article <1991Mar10.182907.9845@panix.uucp> alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) writes: < >>Well, the trick with patching _HFSDispatch in order to fake multiple < >>HFS volumes on one single volume has always been a hack, and thus < >>is not suppored by neither A/UX or MacOS. < > < >Please. It works. Thousands of people use it, and you should support it. < >No debate is permissible on this subject. :-) < < Well, MacOS emulation specs are based on the Inside Macintosh documentation, < and there's never been a official policy of supporting patches that are < not defined by Apple documentation. This is also true of System 7, which < may or may not break INITs that patch _HFSDispatch. < Would you please all shut up about patching _HFSDispatch. Its nonsense. If SilverLining or anyone else does so, it's for reasons that probably have nothing to do with multiple volumes. Also, Inside Mac does _not_ state that there may be only one HFS partition on any SCSI device. That's a (stupid, IMHO) restriction which is enforced by the Apple Installer and by A/UX 2.0. < < >This is the real problem. It is disgraceful that HD Setup won't partition < >3rd party drives. I wouldn't mind if it could put drivers on them too, but < >that's not so critical. [...] < < A couple of days ago I understood why we won't support TPV drives < with HD Setup. I had this problem with a LaCie drive, where using [...] PLEASE! Listen to one another! Changing modes on a device is a function of the driver. Alexis wasn't asking to change the driver or any other characteristic of the hard disk, only to change the partition layout which should be an entirely different problem. Partition layouts are standardized in IM V, right? < Anyway, if a customer reads that HD Setup can partition *any* < TPV hard disk, and tries with HD Setup, which can't possibly know < all the possible firmware programming setups and firmware control < codes for every TPV hard disk drive, then.... < See above. -- Matthias Urlichs -- urlichs@smurf.sub.org -- urlichs@smurf.ira.uka.de /(o\ Humboldtstrasse 7 - 7500 Karlsruhe 1 - FRG -- +49-721-621127(0700-2330) \o)/
blob@Apple.COM (Brian Bechtel) (03/13/91)
cruff@ncar.ucar.edu (Craig Ruff) writes: Note: I'm a user, not an implementor of A/UX. Pretend that the answers you see below come from blob@somewhereelse.com instead of blob@apple.com (Heck, I recently became a manager, so I don't have to get anything right!) >1) Are AppleTalk laser printers supported via the printer port? > I don't want to buy any extra cards... Yes. >2) How much usable space is available on a 160 Mb drive? > I assume I can always remove unused stuff I don't need. A/UX 2.0 left me with about 11 Mb free on an 80Mb hard disk. Adding X11R4 will eat most of that. This implies that on a 160Mb, you're about half-full. >3) What 3rd party disks have support for A/UX partitions and drivers? Lots. FWB (hammer drives) are pretty good, from what I hear. SilverLining from LaCie will format most third-party drives to be compatible with A/UX. >4) I guess that MacOS HFS drives (partitions) are mountable under A/UX. True? A/UX supports 1 Mac partition per drive. If you have multiple Mac partitions, you'll only see the first one. >5) Who do I call to find the anointed A/UX dealers in my area? In the USA, call 1-800-538-9696. I guess you'd call 1-408-996-1010 (our corporate telephone number) if you aren't in the USA. --Brian Bechtel blob@apple.com "My opinion, not Apple's"
ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) (03/14/91)
In article <"5d1i2.[x@smurf.sub.org> urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs) writes: >Changing modes on a device is a function of the driver. >Alexis wasn't asking to change the driver or any other characteristic of the >hard disk, only to change the partition layout which should be an entirely >different problem. Partition layouts are standardized in IM V, right? Partition layouts are standardized in IM V, hard disk SCSI command setups are defined by hard disk vendors. HD Setup does not work with telepathy. >< Anyway, if a customer reads that HD Setup can partition *any* >< TPV hard disk, and tries with HD Setup, which can't possibly know >< all the possible firmware programming setups and firmware control >< codes for every TPV hard disk drive, then.... >See above. Exactly. A lot of people believe that the hard disk problems they encounter has to do with the partition map. Which is not the case at all. PS: Could we all have a slightly more civilized methology to communicate on this newsgroup. I personally don't want comp.unix.aux become like an alt.flame group where most of the time is spend flaming each others. Regards, Kent Sandvik Disclaimer: Personal activity done after 8.00pm
alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) (03/17/91)
In article <50137@apple.Apple.COM> ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) writes: > alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) writes: >>>Well, the trick with patching _HFSDispatch in order to fake multiple >>>HFS volumes on one single volume has always been a hack, and thus >>>is not suppored by neither A/UX or MacOS. >> >>Please. It works. Thousands of people use it, and you should support it. >>No debate is permissible on this subject. :-) > >Well, MacOS emulation specs are based on the Inside Macintosh documentation, >and there's never been a official policy of supporting patches that are >not defined by Apple documentation. This is also true of System 7, which >may or may not break INITs that patch _HFSDispatch. Sorry, my meaning wasn't clear. I don't know what you're talking about with this _HFSDispatch business (but I'm guessing it was some poor way of doing multiple Mac partitions on a disk). I was referring to the totally legitimate way that several formatters, such as the MicroNet, put multiple MacOS volumes on a simgle disk. They follow the partition map specs in IM-V exactly. A/UX's lack of full support is a flaw in A/UX, and as far as I can tell, unjustifiable from a cost-to-implement standpoint (when you scan the partition map at boot time for a MacOS partition, just scan the whole map- don't stop when you get the first one... this is not a lot of code...) BTW, I'll add that the MicroNet formatter is probably the best in the business. They've had bug-free support for A/UX partitions for over two years. And, unlike most drivers (including Apple's), theirs has been 32-bit clean for a long time, and thus didn't have a problem of crashing under System 7 in 32-bit mode. >>>Otherwise HD Setup with Apple harddisks asks for a rich set of >>>possible A/UX setups before the installation. The installation >>>software is quite different compared with the old A/UX 1.1 >>>installation program. >> >>This is the real problem. It is disgraceful that HD Setup won't partition >>3rd party drives. I wouldn't mind if it could put drivers on them too, but >>that's not so critical. But Apple refuses to sell reasonably large disks, >>and sticks us with the archaic and arcane dp. I was under the strong >>impression that this was going to change in 2.0.1, but if I did hear such >>a commitment, it wasn't kept. What happened to "easy to use" and "great user >>interface"? > >A couple of days ago I understood why we won't support TPV drives >with HD Setup. I had this problem with a LaCie drive, where using >the Silverlining partition program cured the hard disk. Because >the Silverlining program *programmed* the Hard disk not to send >obscure SCSI command calls that the generic A/UX dev. driver >filters out. > >The reason for filtering is simple - the UNIX kernel should not die >suddenly [while MacOS allows this, I hope this will be fixed soon >under MacOS as well]. You're implying that LaCie can write formatters better than any Apple programmers. This is certainly historically true, but there's no reason it has to stay this way. >Anyway, if a customer reads that HD Setup can partition *any* >TPV hard disk, and tries with HD Setup, which can't possibly know >all the possible firmware programming setups and firmware control >codes for every TPV hard disk drive, then.... > >In the worst case he gets angry, and if he's rich and is really mad >he will sue Apple - and court cases are not fun. This is a straw man. You don't have to _guarantee_ anything. But you _could_ list the drives it did work with- if you tested with drives from Seagate, Quantum, Maxtor, Conners, and Miniscribe, you'd make 95%+ of your potential users happy. And as you probably know, the above-named vendors' drives are quite compatible with A/UX. It wouldn't take much (if any) work to teach HD Setup about them. >I hope that each one sees this dilemma. The simple case would be >to define a generic call, something like "A/UX sanity reprogramming >control code", and HD Setup sends this call to the TPV hard disk >when the end user wants to use the hard disk for A/UX. > >Then again, we can't predict that all the Third Party Vendors will >implement this scheme, and we are back in the twilight zone of >angry customers and liability issues. It is not their responsibility to establish a SCSI 1.1 standard with special Apple commands. It is *your* responsibility, as a vendor trying to sell a product into a crowded marketplace, to make your product as convenient as is possible. >>This whole thing makes me angry because Apple has already done the work. >>All it would take to make HD Setup work would be the deletion of a few lines >>of code. > >If life was that simple.... SIAC and Apple is able to test those drives >that Apple sells so they work with A/UX partitions without problems. > >Anyway, this area is very important for the future, and hopefully >by providing and assisting TPV hard disk vendors with information >we could avoid the problem with non-working hard disks and working >partition programs. This is simply not sufficient. As long as you take this attitude you (not personally, Kent- "you" means Apple) have failed to provide a complete and sufficient solution. You ignore the fact that many users, *especially large corporate and goverment users*, will not buy third party stuff, or would rather avoid it at all costs. The less dependance on it, the better. (Of course, that also brings up the question- When will Apple start selling real disk drives instead of the 80MB toys? {And that inflammatory question is exactly the question- and the tone- you'll hear from many buyers!} ) A few days ago I bought a Seagate/Imprimis Elite 1300MB disk. (And it is *FAST!*) I hooked it up to an RS/6000, and with SMIT I had it up and running in minutes. The Elite didn't even exist when this IBM system was built. If IBM can do this, so can you. --- Alexis Rosen Owner/Sysadmin, PANIX Public Access Unix, NY {cmcl2,apple}!panix!alexis
alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) (03/17/91)
John Sovereign writes: >A/UX is available immediately from all authorized A/UX resellers in various >media configurations for the following manufacturer's suggested retail >prices: > >Macintosh IIfx 4MB/160HD $9269 >Macintosh IIfx 8MB/160HD $9669 >Macintosh IIci 8MB/80HD $6869 >Macintosh IIsi 5MB/80HD $5169 (includes NuBus Adapter > Card) > >(The above systems ship configured with A/UX 2.0.1 preinstalled on the >internal hard disk.) Just in case people aren't aware of this... Strangely enough, if you want to buy a Mac IIfx, it's cheaper to buy most configurations _with A/UX_ and then throw it away, than it is to buy a regular Mac IIfx. In effect, Apple is paying you to take A/UX. I think this is also true for the IIci. While this was totally merited with A/UX 1.x, it's probably overly generous for 2.0. It's just a shame they aren't a bit more reasonable about the cost of the standalone A/UX product. And I still think they owe us 1.x purchasers free upgrades... --- Alexis Rosen Owner/Sysadmin, PANIX Public Access Unix, NY {cmcl2,apple}!panix!alexis
rob@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu (Robert K Shull) (03/18/91)
In article <1991Mar17.075747.1576@panix.uucp> alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) writes: >In article <50137@apple.Apple.COM> ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) writes: >> alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) writes: >>A couple of days ago I understood why we won't support TPV drives >>with HD Setup. I had this problem with a LaCie drive, where using >>the Silverlining partition program cured the hard disk. Because >>the Silverlining program *programmed* the Hard disk not to send >>obscure SCSI command calls that the generic A/UX dev. driver >>filters out. >> >>The reason for filtering is simple - the UNIX kernel should not die >>suddenly [while MacOS allows this, I hope this will be fixed soon >>under MacOS as well]. > >You're implying that LaCie can write formatters better than any Apple >programmers. This is certainly historically true, but there's no reason >it has to stay this way. I'd like to point out that LaCie DOES NOT guarantee that their drivers work with third party drives. In fact, they specifically mention that their software is made to work with their drives, and might fail on others. They'll sell the software to you, and assume you know what you're doing and will take the risk. By the way, if you want an example of a drive that doesn't work with Silverlining, try the old Rodime 102. My Mac would crash everytime the formatter found a bad sector and tried to map it out. One time to the point where I got the pretty tones and the sad mac every time I turned on the machine, BEFORE the floppy was checked. Fun with an internal drive. >>Anyway, if a customer reads that HD Setup can partition *any* >>TPV hard disk, and tries with HD Setup, which can't possibly know >>all the possible firmware programming setups and firmware control >>codes for every TPV hard disk drive, then.... >> >>In the worst case he gets angry, and if he's rich and is really mad >>he will sue Apple - and court cases are not fun. >This is a straw man. You don't have to _guarantee_ anything. But you _could_ I don't know. In the minds of most users, if it even TRIES to format the drive, that means that Apple supports it. And if it doesn't work, it's Apple's fault. And, as I've heard again and again, PERCEPTION is far more important than REALITY. It's not reality that sells equipment, it's perception. Especially "first impression". We have enthusiasts here who support everything from Apollo to Zenith, usually because of which salesman got hold of them first. Plugging in your hard drive, having the formatter crank away on it for thirty minutes or so, then lock up your machine completely is not a good "first impression". Having it kill your machine to the point where you have to take it back to the dealer is not a good "first impression". >list the drives it did work with- if you tested with drives from Seagate, >Quantum, Maxtor, Conners, and Miniscribe, you'd make 95%+ of your potential tested? which drives? which hardware revisions? which ROM revisions? what hardware jumpering? what settings on the error page? >It is not their responsibility to establish a SCSI 1.1 standard with special >Apple commands. It is *your* responsibility, as a vendor trying to sell a >product into a crowded marketplace, to make your product as convenient as >is possible. What else should Apple provide support/drivers for? Third party tape drives? Scanners? Printers? Monitors and display cards? Slide makers? Interface boards? >A few days ago I bought a Seagate/Imprimis Elite 1300MB disk. (And it is >*FAST!*) I hooked it up to an RS/6000, and with SMIT I had it up and running >in minutes. The Elite didn't even exist when this IBM system was built. Congratulations. You happened to find a combination of machine and drive that actually worked. Don't assume that that means EVERY machine and EVERY drive will work together. We've gotten a nice lesson in SCSI standards over the last few weeks. We bought five Fujitsu 650 meg drives. The work fine on the Mac. They work fine on the RS/6000. They completely lock up the SCSI bus on a DEC 5000. They wait 30 minutes, THEN lock up the SCSI bus on a 386 running Banyan Vines. >Alexis Rosen Robert Shull -- Robert K. Shull rob@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu chinet!uokmax!rob
sramtrc@windy.dsir.govt.nz (03/18/91)
> < >1) Will A/UX 2.0.1 resolve the problem( undocumented feature:-) ) > < > of only one Mac partition per physical device (hard drive)? > < > < Well, the trick with patching _HFSDispatch in order to fake multiple > < HFS volumes on one single volume has always been a hack, and thus > < is not suppored by neither A/UX or MacOS. > > Nobody is patching _HFSDispatch here. We're talking about multiple _physical_ > partitions. All such a partition needs is an entry in the MacOS drive queue > and an update to the A/UX disk driver (".AUXHFSx", for x = 0..7 -- though why > there's a driver for ID 7 is beyond me to recognize more than one MacOS > partition on any given SCSI device. > Lots of MacOS SCSI drivers do this, and there's no hackery involved > I have a program that does all this stuff to allow multiple Mac partitions per physical drive. If anyone wants a copy I can send it to them. I will be releasing it later anyway. I just need to think up an icon for it. It doesn't use any hackery, just a bit of quackery. Tony Cooper sramtrc@albert.dsir.govt.nz
ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) (03/18/91)
In article <1991Mar17.075747.1576@panix.uucp> alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) writes: >In article <50137@apple.Apple.COM> ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) writes: >> alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) writes: >>The reason for filtering is simple - the UNIX kernel should not die >>suddenly [while MacOS allows this, I hope this will be fixed soon >>under MacOS as well]. >You're implying that LaCie can write formatters better than any Apple >programmers. This is certainly historically true, but there's no reason >it has to stay this way. LaCie knows how their HD SCSI setup works with A/UX -i.e. how to go around the problems. >>Anyway, if a customer reads that HD Setup can partition *any* >>TPV hard disk, and tries with HD Setup, which can't possibly know >>all the possible firmware programming setups and firmware control >>codes for every TPV hard disk drive, then.... >This is a straw man. You don't have to _guarantee_ anything. But you _could_ >list the drives it did work with- if you tested with drives from Seagate, >Quantum, Maxtor, Conners, and Miniscribe, you'd make 95%+ of your potential >users happy. And as you probably know, the above-named vendors' drives are >quite compatible with A/UX. It wouldn't take much (if any) work to teach HD >Setup about them. Oh well, it's really fun to work for a company and get all the flaming on you, especially when you are not even working inside A/UX engineering. Anyway, I will try to clear this thing out, once and for all. I'm sure that concerning TPV hard disk products there will happen *a lot* soon. I can't comment abount things that may or may not happen, or be marketed (usual Apple disclaimer), but the issue with TPV drives is very hot inside Apple. I just wanted to point out the problems with TPV drives that don't follow all the guidelines for nice and clean HD drives that works with both MacOS and A/UX. If we, Apple of all the companies, are able to get them working, then TPVs should also be able. But we don't control them. If we promise that HD Setup works with all the TPV drives, and it does not, then we are lying, and responsible for our statements. >It is not their responsibility to establish a SCSI 1.1 standard with special >Apple commands. It is *your* responsibility, as a vendor trying to sell a >product into a crowded marketplace, to make your product as convenient as >is possible. It is in a way our responsibility to provide guidelines how to write nice HD drives. But we are not Gestapo. >>Anyway, this area is very important for the future, and hopefully >>by providing and assisting TPV hard disk vendors with information >>we could avoid the problem with non-working hard disks and working >>partition programs. I still think that with cooperation with TPV we will be able to some day have a HD market where every Macintosh hard disk drive works with both MacOS and A/UX. The situation back in 1987/88 was really bad concerning A/UX and TPV disk drives. We've come a long way. And many good TPV hard disk drives work perfectly with A/UX today. And if HD Setup does not do the work, then Silverlining and CMS are valid candidates. Back in 1988 dp was the only way to fix non-Apple hard disk drives. Those were the times :-). Regards, Kent Sandvik -- Disclaimer: Private activity on the Net, in no way connected to any company. Zippy++ says: END, END; or END. is sure clearer than "}".
kaufman@neon.Stanford.EDU (Marc T. Kaufman) (03/18/91)
In article <1991Mar17.182949.12942@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu> rob@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu (Robert K Shull) writes: >In article <1991Mar17.075747.1576@panix.uucp> alexis@panix.uucp (Alexis Rosen) writes: {I probably lost several levels of quoting as to who really wrote this...} ->>Anyway, if a customer reads that HD Setup can partition *any* ->>TPV hard disk, and tries with HD Setup, which can't possibly know ->>all the possible firmware programming setups and firmware control ->>codes for every TPV hard disk drive, then.... ->>In the worst case he gets angry, and if he's rich and is really mad ->>he will sue Apple - and court cases are not fun. Wait a minute. (Alexis, I think) was talking about PARTITIONING and you are talking about FORMATTING. They are NOT the same thing. We are talking about putting a partition map on the disk, like with dp, which ONLY requires Read, Write and (maybe) Read Capacity. The disk is already formatted, no? We have already determined that the disk is A/UX compatible, and so can be read/written with the A/UX driver. .>This is a straw man. You don't have to _guarantee_ anything. But you _could_ >I don't know. In the minds of most users, if it even TRIES to format the >drive, that means that Apple supports it. And if it doesn't work, it's >Apple's fault. Repeat after me: "Partition, not FORMAT!". Any OS that can do a makefs is powerful enough to write a partition map. If the OS can mount multiple partitions to A/UX, then there is absolutely no reason it can't mount multiple HFS partitions. This has NOTHING to do with unsuported SCSI commands. Marc Kaufman (kaufman@Neon.stanford.edu)
ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) (03/19/91)
In article <1991Mar18.031036.5667@neon.Stanford.EDU> kaufman@neon.Stanford.EDU (Marc T. Kaufman) writes: >Repeat after me: "Partition, not FORMAT!". Any OS that can do a makefs is >powerful enough to write a partition map. If the OS can mount multiple >partitions to A/UX, then there is absolutely no reason it can't mount >multiple HFS partitions. This has NOTHING to do with unsuported SCSI >commands. Well, this is the danger, the customer happily both formats and partitions the disk, boots A/UX from the newly formatted and partitioned (and installed) disk, and suddenly the hard disk starts spewing SCSI commands sets that the A/UX dev driver don't know anything about. This is the dilemma in one sentence. And sure, it has nothing, nothing, to do with multiple HFS partitions (don't know who did that connection in the first place, not me). The HD Setup is not aware that it needs to send off a string that maybe reprograms the EEPROM or something similar to a more narrow set of commands so the drivers won't complain. I hope this clarified the situation. If not, send me email and I could send you back some stories about things like this happening in real life. Regards, Kent Sandvik, MacDTS -- Disclaimer: Private activity on the Net, in no way connected to any company. Zippy++ says: END, END; or END. is sure clearer than "}".
urlichs@smurf.sub.org (Matthias Urlichs) (03/27/91)
In comp.unix.aux, article <12605@goofy.Apple.COM>,
ksand@Apple.COM (Kent Sandvik) writes:
<
< Well, this is the danger, the customer happily both formats and partitions
< the disk, boots A/UX from the newly formatted and partitioned (and installed)
< disk, and suddenly the hard disk starts spewing SCSI commands sets that
< the A/UX dev driver don't know anything about. This is the dilemma in
< one sentence.
<
Simple question: Which SCSI commands does A/UX use that could conceivably
cause problems? Any CCS-compliant hard disk should work, shouldn't it?
The only trouble I ever had was caused by the PER bit not being set, and
A/UX getting confused about the size of the appropriate mode page while
trying to rectify that -- and I think it could continue with PER clear
without problems.
Unfortunately I don't have the 2.0.1 device driver's kit, or I'd test it.
The answer may not be as simple; if it indeed isn't, this should probably
continue in email.
< And sure, it has nothing, nothing, to do with multiple HFS partitions
< (don't know who did that connection in the first place, not me).
<
The connection itself, however, is easy to make: Both are limitations imposed
by the HD Setup application which a lot of people don't like at all -- see
the resulting semi-flames. (Go to alt.flames if you want to see some real
ones. ;-)
--
Matthias Urlichs -- urlichs@smurf.sub.org -- urlichs@smurf.ira.uka.de /(o\
Humboldtstrasse 7 - 7500 Karlsruhe 1 - FRG -- +49-721-621127(0700-2330) \o)/