Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!hbetel From: hbetel@watserv1.waterloo.edu (Heather) Newsgroups: comp.os.minix Subject: Re: disk geometry, was Re: 3.5" disks, PS/2 model 50Z Message-ID: <627@watserv1.waterloo.edu> Date: 16 Jan 90 02:24:01 GMT References: <7866@nigel.udel.EDU> Reply-To: hbetel@watserv1.waterloo.edu (Heather) Organization: U. of Waterloo, Ontario Lines: 10 What sort of header does a tar file have? Do we want to maintain compatability with other tar programs? If this is not important, there is an easy solution to the bootblock problem: make the tar header look like a bootblock. I don't have the bootblock structure in front of me, but it seems to me that we could put in all the important stuff, like disk size/geometry, any flags the rom bootstrap expects to see, and the rest holds tar information (whatever that happens to be). This means that in a 360k disk, the first 512 bytes are necessarily wasted, but I think It is worth it.