🚀 go-pugleaf

Two qwestshuns:

1)  How exactly does PackBits pack bits?  IM says that it takes any three
consecutive identical bytes and compresses them.  Must this be on a word
boundary?  What signals to UnpackBits that the next byte is actually a
repetition?  Specifically, I want to take a MacPaint document, which consists
of 720 PackBitted packed bit 'arrays' and convert them back to their original
bits - on a non-mac machine.  So I need the algorithm that packs the bits.

2) I just got an SE to use, and I started it up with RamDisk+1.2.  I load in
the whole 5.4/4 System Folder, and then the startup disk ejects.  Now I can
work diskless, etc.  I decide to copy MacWrite over from another disk onto
the RamDisk.  Fine.  Then I get the old bombola.  OK, I choose to reset.  The
Mac dings the bell, goes through the memory test (or seems to, since it takes
the same amount of time with the diagonally striped screen up as it does on
startup) and I insert the same startup disk as before.  The 'Welcome to
Macintosh' banner appears, and RamDisk+ starts.  RamDisk+ puts up its start
messages - and then ejects its own disk - without copying anything to the
RamDisk.  However - the RamDisk that shows as the only disk on the desktop
still contains the system folder AND the MacWrite that I had copied earlier.
How does a RamDisk survive a soft reset?  I thought all of memory was wiped
during the memtest...

				Marc Pawliger
				mp1w#@andrew.cmu.edu
				mp1w@cmuccvma.bitnet