Jeff Blakeney wrote:
On Tue, 11 Feb 2003 22:34:57 GMT, "Phil Abel" <phil_nospam_abel@prodigy.nospam.net> wrote:I think GSHK gives you a "warning" when attempting to do a 3.5" disk shk that it is an obsolete method and recommends you do it by file instead.I've never understood why that warning is there. There are many instances when having a disk archive is preferable, if not necessary, to make things work. For instance, if there is an installer program on the disk you are archiving and that program looks for its files on a disk with a specific volume number or name. It is easier for users to just unpack a disk archive which will create the disk the way they need it than it is for them to unpack the files to a disk and then have to read a text file to find out what the volume number or name of the disk needs to be and then set it. Under DOS 3.3 this would mean either sector editting the disk or having to INIT a new disk and then copy the files again.
The warning: "Disk archives are an old archive format, are often larger than file archives, and many people consider them inconvenient. Disk archives are meant only for those occasions when there is no other way to archive something (such as old DOS 3.3 disks)."
You're right, there are times when a disk archive is required, but I think the problem is many people who were used to working with floppy disks were archiving entire disks when they didn't need to. This becomes a problem when the recipient has a hard drive and has to extract the archive to a floppy (especially if they have no 800KB RAM disk set up) just so they can copy the files back to the hard drive. The warning is basically saying only use disk archives if you have some special reason to, since file archives work equally well when extracted to any type of disk, but disk archives require the original disk type.
Now that a lot of people are using emulators the same problem is reoccuring i.e. people are distributing disk archives of ProDOS software again. This is easier for the emulator users but harder for a real Apple II to cope with.
--
Roger Johnstone, Invercargill, New Zealand
Apple II - FutureCop:LAPD - iMac Game Wizard
http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~rojaws/
________________________________________________________________________
"..we discovered that, at least as of a few years ago, every tactical
nuclear weapon in Europe manned by U.S. personnel was targeted by an
Apple II computer. Now, we didn't sell computers to the military; they
went out and bought them at a dealer's, I guess. But it didn't make us
feel good to know that our computers were being used to target nuclear
weapons in Europe. The only bright side of it was that at least they
weren't [Radio Shack] TRS-80s! Thank God for that."
Steve Jobs, Playboy interview, 1985