Re: 8-bit unzip utility

[mdj <mdj.mdj@gmail.com>]

On Jun 23, 3:22 am, "Michael J. Mahon" <mjma...@aol.com> wrote:
> mdj wrote:
> > On Jun 21, 7:02 pm, "Michael J. Mahon" <mjma...@aol.com> wrote:
>
> >>I have several times had a need to pass a small integer to a program
> >>and thought it would be most convenient to pass it on the command line
> >>that invoked the program.
>
> >>ProDOS parses, converts, and ignores the "V" (volume) specifier after a
> >>program name (which is interesting, since it should probably give a
> >>syntax error).
>
> >>This opens the possibility of passing a single-byte value, since values
> >>of 0-255 are acceptable.
>
> >>Unfortunately, ProDOS discards the value after converting it to binary,
> >>so the program will have to re-scan the "V" parameter out of the input
> >>buffer ($200) and re-convert it, but at least it's possible.
>
> > Huh! Well I never knew that. Thanks Michael, that's handy to know.
>
> > Curious why they decided to implement some 'dummy' command arguments
> > for DOS 3.3 compatibility but left others out; MAXFILES for instance.
>
> I'm not sure this was left in for compatibility--probably just the left
> hand not having the same objectives as the right hand.  ;-)

It does seem a little odd that it would be left in, other than by
design...

> I wish that they had stuffed the converted value into the BASIC.SYSTEM
> global page byte reserved (uselessly) for the Volume, though.  They
> saved one STA and cost a re-scan for someone who wants to exploit it.
> (This might be a good patch, now that BASIC.SYSTEM isn't likely to
> change any more. ;-)

We need to come up with an effective management system for such
changes. If such a thing were in place, continuous improvement would
be at least theoretically possible.

I run a few (runtime) patches to BASIC.SYSTEM, the main one being
removing the (IMO) redundant CAT vs CATALOG "feature" and just having
CAT work appropriately for the display mode. Admittedly this is
primarily due to laziness on my part; why CATALOG when you can CAT ?

I also add a PFX shortcut for PREFIX, mainly because too many years of
Merlin'ing caused my brain to start using PFX when I shouldn't :-)

Matt