Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!crdgw1!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!samsung!cs.utexas.edu!yale!cmcl2!adm!smoke!gwyn From: gwyn@smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn) Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2 Subject: Re: Copying System 5.0 to /ram5 Message-ID: <13739@smoke.BRL.MIL> Date: 5 Sep 90 03:44:05 GMT References: <13181@netcom.UUCP> <44521@apple.Apple.COM> Organization: U.S. Army Ballistic Research Laboratory, APG, MD. Lines: 21 In article <44521@apple.Apple.COM> mattd@Apple.COM (Matt Deatherage) writes: -In article dragon@pawl.rpi.edu (Carl L. Norden) writes: ->In article <13181@netcom.UUCP> avery@netcom.UUCP (Avery Colter) writes: ->>And copying file-by-file with Copy II Plus did not work. ->There is a good reason for that. GSOS writes some files a slight bit ->different from Prodos 8 & 16. The only files that act 'dangerous' on these ->older systems seems to be 'FINDER.DATA' (& ROOT) and sometimes ICN files. -This is absolute bunk. The only difference in the way ProDOS 8 and the -ProDOS FST write files is that the ProDOS FST will automatically sparse files -if it can. This will only affect programs doing direct block-level access -to read their files; all file system reads and writes will behave as expected -with sparse files. The Finder only does file system reads for $C9 and icon -files. There is nothing "dangerous" about these files or GS/OS in general. More importantly, Copy II Plus, like practically all existing ProDOS-8 copy utilities, when copying on a file-by-file basis fails to copy the resource fork of extended files. Thus if you try to install IIGS System Disk 5.0.2 files by such means, the resulting OS will not work right. "File forks" are an invention of the devil, or at least of someone who liked unnecessary complexity.