DeadHead@cup.portal.com (Bruce M Ong) (12/07/90)
The ISC2.2 Dossette will NOT recognize any 1.2 mb floppy that is formated by any REAL command.com. Is this old news? The ISC2.0.2 Dossette works with the 1.2MB disk. Everytime I try to access the 1.2MB disk with 2.2 dossette, it complains about the diskette not being present. Is there a way to get around this? The VPIX that comes with ISC2.2 also does not recognize the 1.2 diskette - even when I tell it that B disk is using /dev/rdsk/f1q15dt. (But, the dossette can FORMAT a 1.2 diskette... strange) Can I use 2.0.2 dossette on 2.2? /bruce deadhead@cup.portal.com
richard@octel.UUCP (Richard Karasik) (12/08/90)
In article <36634@cup.portal.com> DeadHead@cup.portal.com (Bruce M Ong) writes: >The ISC2.2 Dossette will NOT recognize any 1.2 mb floppy that is formated >by any REAL command.com. Is this old news? The ISC2.0.2 Dossette works >with the 1.2MB disk. Everytime I try to access the 1.2MB disk with >2.2 dossette, it complains about the diskette not being present. Is there >a way to get around this? The VPIX that comes with ISC2.2 also does not >recognize the 1.2 diskette - even when I tell it that B disk is using >/dev/rdsk/f1q15dt. (But, the dossette can FORMAT a 1.2 diskette... strange) This is a known problem with ISC and has nothing to do with format. As of this writing ISC hasn';t the faintest idea why it breaks. usually looks like FD0 not present blah bla blha the work around is to put another scratch diskette into the drive, and cat * >/dev/fd0 where * is any number of files -sometimes one character will work sometimes 100K. At the comclusion of this, put your original diskette back in and try again to get your info on or off. It seems that cat >/dev/fd0 heals the wound temporarily. (BOY is this a corker). Richard karasik richard@octel.com
gsteckel@vergil.East.Sun.COM (Geoff Steckel - Sun BOS Hardware) (12/09/90)
>In article <36634@cup.portal.com> DeadHead@cup.portal.com (Bruce M Ong) writes: >>The ISC2.2 Dossette will NOT recognize any 1.2 mb floppy that is formated >>by any REAL command.com. Is this old news? The ISC2.0.2 Dossette works >>with the 1.2MB disk. Everytime I try to access the 1.2MB disk with >>2.2 dossette, it complains about the diskette not being present. Is there >>a way to get around this? The VPIX that comes with ISC2.2 also does not >>recognize the 1.2 diskette - even when I tell it that B disk is using >>/dev/rdsk/f1q15dt. (But, the dossette can FORMAT a 1.2 diskette... strange) I've seen this problem repeatedly on my system. It seems to have something to do with the automatic format recognition (360K/1.2M) code. My current workaround is to `od /dev/rdsk/f0q15dt' - use the device name that explicitly matches the floppy format. Once the system has been forcibly told what density/format the floppy is, it seems to work correctly until shutdown. It also seems to correctly auto detect format on subsequent floppies. I hope this information is useful to someone. geoff steckel (gwes@wjh12.harvard.EDU) (...!husc6!wjh12!omnivore!gws) Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with Sun Microsystems, despite the From: line. This posting is entirely the author's responsibility.
egray@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu (Emmet P. Gray) (12/09/90)
In article <36634@cup.portal.com> DeadHead@cup.portal.com (Bruce M Ong) writes: >The ISC2.2 Dossette will NOT recognize any 1.2 mb floppy that is formated >by any REAL command.com. Is this old news? The ISC2.0.2 Dossette works >with the 1.2MB disk. Everytime I try to access the 1.2MB disk with >2.2 dossette, it complains about the diskette not being present. Is there >a way to get around this? The VPIX that comes with ISC2.2 also does not >recognize the 1.2 diskette - even when I tell it that B disk is using >/dev/rdsk/f1q15dt. (But, the dossette can FORMAT a 1.2 diskette... strange) An alternate solution might be to use a set of programs called Mtools. Mtools is a public domain collection of programs to allow Unix systems to read, write and manipulate files on an MSDOS filesystem (typically a diskette). Mtools supports "real" MSDOS hard disk partitions, VP/ix disk "images", multiple density floppies, etc. The following MSDOS commands are emulated: Mtool MSDOS name equivalent Description ----- ---- ----------- mattrib ATTRIB change MSDOS file attribute flags mcd CD change MSDOS directory mcopy COPY copy MSDOS files to/from Unix mdel DEL/ERASE delete an MSDOS file mdir DIR display an MSDOS directory mformat FORMAT add an MSDOS filesystem to a low level format mlabel LABEL make an MSDOS volume label mmd MD/MKDIR make an MSDOS sub directory mrd RD/RMDIR remove an MSDOS sub directory mread COPY low level read (copy) an MSDOS file to Unix mren REN/RENAME rename an existing MSDOS file mtype TYPE display contents of an MSDOS file mwrite COPY low level write (copy) a Unix file to MSDOS The current version of Mtools is v2.0.3 (meaning version 2.0 at patch level 3). Mtools v2.0 was posted to the unix-pc.sources news group (and mailed to the moderator of comp.sources.unix) on the 17th of September 1990. Since then, patches 1, 2 and 3 have been posted to unix-pc.sources, comp.sources.bugs, and emailed to Rich Salz. In addition, the current version of Mtools and all the patches are available via anonymous ftp from cerl.cecer.army.mil (129.229.1.101). Emmet P. Gray US Army, HQ III Corps & Fort Hood ...!uunet!uiucuxc!fthood!egray Attn: AFZF-DE-ENV fthood!egray@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu Directorate of Engineering & Housing Environmental Management Office Fort Hood, TX 76544-5057
jon@hitachi.uucp (Jon Ryshpan) (12/15/90)
In article <358@octelb.octel.UUCP> richard@octel.UUCP (Richard Karasik) writes: >In article <36634@cup.portal.com> DeadHead@cup.portal.com (Bruce M Ong) writes: >>The ISC2.2 Dossette will NOT recognize any 1.2 mb floppy that is formated >>by any REAL command.com. >... > >This is a known problem with ISC and has nothing to do with format. I've seen a lot of this too. The select light on the floppy comes on, then nothing happens except for the console messages FD(0) : diskette not present - please insert Here's my fix. I wrote a program called starta to read one byte from /dev/fd0. Here is is: ======= ======= Starta starts here ======= ======= #include <stdio.h> main(argc, argv) int argc; char **argv; { FILE *fd; if ((fd = fopen("/dev/rfd0", "r")) == NULL) { perror("cant open /dev/rfd0"); exit(1); } if (getc(fd) == EOF) { perror("cant access /dev/rfd0"); exit(1); } exit(0); } ======= ======= Starta ends here ======= ======= Then I replaced dossette with the following shell script: #!/bin/csh starta; /usr/bin/dossette $* Similar scripts for dosdir, doscopy, etc. This all seems to work OK. Dossette seems to be "smart" and to read the floppy in a way that makes it not work. Ordinary "dumb" accesses like the one in starta act as specified in the manual. The "#!/bin/csh" is important. If you execute a similar script under sh, it doesn't work right for dosdir, etc. Dosdir starts before starta can finish initializing the drive, so you get one "FD(0) not present" message before dosdir begins its work. Wierd no? It would be nice if I could get the getc() to fail if there is some problem, line a diskette really not present. Unfortunately what happens is that you get a series of messages on the *console* telling you to put in the floppy. This is not useful if the console is not the currently active screen. Jonathan Ryshpan <...!uunet!hitachi!jon> M/S 420 (415) 244-7369 Hitachi America Ltd. 2000 Sierra Pt. Pkwy. Brisbane CA 94005-1819