🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Nov8.180850.6211@news2.cis.umn.edu>  
walt@molbio.cbs.umn.edu (Walter Sauerbier) writes:
> Our new color NeXTstation ha great problems writing to MS-DOS formatted 
> floppies.  Even if this subject has been beaten to death already, it is
> a very current, very real unsolved problem for us.  
> 
> Problems:
> 1) You can't initialize an unformatted disk to MS-DOS format unless you
>   (deviously) first insert an MS-DOS disk, select it, then manually  
eject
>   that disk and supplant it with your unformatted one.  I am  
uncomfortable 
>   with this because it's like unmounting/mounting a filesystem without  
Mach's
>   knowledge.  Can this cause any harm?
> 2) 1.44MB MS-DOS floppie (formatted on an MS-DOS machine) are often un-
>   writeable.  When I try to copy to them, I get an "Invalid Argument"  
error
>   in the process inspector! The disk write-protect is not the problem;  
so
>   what the hell IS*?
> 3) 'Successfully' formatting MS-DOS diskettes, and writing files to them 
>   often yields diskettes that appear EMPTY to MS-DOS machines.  I am  
writing
>   filenames in the proper MS-DOS format (xxxxxxxx.xxx).  


1) Congratulations on finding a way to do this.  I couldn't.

2)  This is a "well-known" bug with 2.2, and only with 2.2.  2.1 and 3.0  
are both better.  Interestingly enough, you could copy long filenames to  
MS-DOS floppies with 2.1, and they would be case-converted and truncated  
to fit.  With 3.0, you must first rename your files to be lower case and  
fit within the DOS 8.3 limits.  If anyone knows how to beat this, I would  
be very grateful.

3) There were several similar problems with 2.1 and 2.2; all I can say  
about 3.0 is that they seem less frequent so far.

Paul
-- 
Paul Lynch
P & L Systems                   (NeXTmail) paul@seer.demon.co.uk
Tel: (0494)671501                      paull@cix.compulink.co.uk
Fax: (0494)680228                       76711.451@compuserve.com