Re: BSCII

[dempson@actrix.gen.nz (David Empson)]

In article <199409051951.PAA25878@cap.gwu.edu>,
Robert Hoover <rhoover@cap.gwu.edu> wrote:
> Welp I have finally gottenaround my local problems getting files.
> 
> Now I am having a hard time with BSCII. I got a shk versoin and 
> un shrunk it and I have a 40 col piecs of junk program that for
> some reason everyone uses...

Everyone?  I doubt it.  Everyone that doesn't have a IIgs or access to
a UNIX system with SCIIBIN, perhaps.  Personally, I use SCSIIBIN on
UNIX, or DESCII (which I wrote) on the IIgs.

I've been thinking of writing a ProDOS-8 version of DESCII, but
haven't had the time or inclination.  Too much like hard work - it
would need a user interface!  :-)

> I am runninga  //e with a 3.5 2 5.25 and a ram disk. I have at 
> least 2 files that are larger than the 5.25's and have to be put
> onto the 3.5. Now I was going to do this from my ramdisk to the
> 3.5 but I keep getting an error in path or name. i as of yet have
> not gotten any of the smaller programs to un bscii eighter.

You may be having a problem with the prefix.  If in doubt, always
specify a full pathname for the output file.  BINSCII doesn't change
the prefix, so whatever prefix was active before running BINSCII will
still be in effect.  One thing you could do would be to set the prefix
from BASIC.SYSTEM before running BINSCII using the "dash" command.

> As a not eto the writer of the program I would sudgest that you 
> update the program some so that ramsidk are useable and a little
> docs would be a bonus.

I haven't heard much from David Whitney for quite a while.

> Oh another item, why in the hell do systems zip and file tat is 
> already shk and bscii ? This just seams to be a waste of time
> because the files have already been compressed...

If the file has been BinSCII encoded, then ZIPping it _will_ have an
effect.  BinSCII expands the file by almost exactly 25%, and it uses a
reduced character set.  This is an ideal situation for Huffman coding,
and ZIP uses a derivative of Huffman coding as one of its compression
techniques.  You usually end up compressing the file by 33%, taking it
back to roughly the same size as the original ShrinkIt file (possibly
a little smaller, because ZIP generally compresses better than ShrinkIt).

A better solution would be to un-BinSCII the file and download the
ShrinkIt file, not ZIP the BinSCII'ed version.  If you don't have a
UNIX shell account and SCIIBIN, this could be difficult.
-- 
David Empson
dempson@actrix.gen.nz
Snail mail: P.O. Box 27-103, Wellington, New Zealand