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From: crs@cpsc6b.cpsc6a.att.com (C. R. Seaman)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc,comp.sys.att
Subject: Re: cpio for DOS and 3b2?
Message-ID: <418@cpsc6b.cpsc6a.att.com>
Date: Tue, 6-Oct-87 15:47:53 EDT
Article-I.D.: cpsc6b.418
Posted: Tue Oct  6 15:47:53 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 10-Oct-87 16:42:55 EDT
References: <472@unirot.UUCP> <1737@killer.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T (CPSC), Oakland, CA
Lines: 46
Keywords: cpio,floppy
Xref: mnetor comp.sys.ibm.pc:8798 comp.sys.att:1432

In article <1737@killer.UUCP>, wnp@killer.UUCP (Wolf Paul) writes:
< In article <472@unirot.UUCP>, samperi@unirot.UUCP (Dominick Samperi) writes:
< > I just finished implementing a UNIX-compatible cpio for DOS on a PC, and
< > I hoped to use it to transfer files via floppy disks between my AT
< > and AT&T 3B2's [ ... ]
< > I've since learned that the 3B2's do not format floppies in the same way
< > that the PC does.
< 
< Two pieces of information on this:
< 
< 1. Rich Salz recently posted Emmet Gray's MTOOLS package to comp.sources.unix.
< This package will allow any UNIX system to read MS-DOS diskettes, provided
< that the UNIX system has a floppy drive physically capable of reading the
< MS-DOS formats (i.e. 40 Tracks @ 9 sectors for 360K disks). This would allow
< you to copy a DOS file to the 3B2 or vice versa, and then unpack it with the
< appropriate archiver.

The *other* requirement for this system of tools is that the machine
already has a driver for the floppy drive that can read and write MS-DOS
formatted disks.  I know of no such driver for the 3B2. (That doesn't
mean there *isn't* one, just that I've never seen it ;-)).

< 2. The MKS Toolkit contains a dd(1) command, which permits reading and
< writing floppy disks without reference to the file system on the disk,
< i.e. it just reads/writes sectors in the proper sequence. With this command,
< I can write an archive to a floppy from DOS like this:
< 
<   find ... | cpio ... | dd of=a:
<
< [ ... ]

It would be much easier to use MKS Toolkit's version (or the UNIX compatible
version you have written) of cpio, create an archive file, use one of the
many file transfer protocols to transfer the file, then use cpio on
the 3B2 to extract the archive.  Cpio archives don't need to be written
to a raw device.  They can just as easily be written to files, which
may (or may not) be more 'portable'.

< Wolf Paul
< ihnp4!killer! [ mcomp! ] wnp

-- 
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