Re: Wonderful ProDOS patch!

[david@wraith.cs.uow.edu.au (David E A Wilson)]

bird@cbnewsd.cb.att.com (j.l.walters) writes:
>Does this patch mean that those that do not get/accept the patch can
>look forward to receiving .SHK files from various sources that they
>cannot read/copy/modify?

That would indeed be a problem.

>If so, I think this is a very BAD idea and needs to be rethought. This
>is a change to the operating system and as such MUST be looked at by
>those that OWN the OS, i.e., Apple Computer. I know it seems that they
>have abandoned us, however, just today I saw a post from Dave Lyons so
>our friends are still with us.

After you make these changes to your copy of ProDOS 8 it is no longer
ProDOS 8 (perhaps we should call it ProDOS 9?). Why Apple put these
restrictions in ProDOS v1.0 I do not know (unless it was backwards
compatibility with SOS on the Apple /// - in which case why did Apple
restrict SOS (after all the DOS 3.x could always use a wider range of
characters in file names and the Apple /// had a full keyboard with U/LC
support)).

>If it is a GREAT idea then I do believe that Apple (read, our friends),
>will somehow come out with a ProDOS 2.0.2 that incorporates these
>changes. If they don't, then we should shun anyone/anything trying to
>modify our platform into certain chaos.

Apple cannot make these changes as it would make existing Apple & 3rd party
applications unable to access these files with strange names. That is why
the GS/OS ProDOS FST encodes lowercase information in the otherwise unused
version fields.

P.S. v2.0.2 came and went. We are now on v2.0.3.