============================================================================ Fill V0.10b - Beta. Smart Multi-file Mover. Copyright ©1993 Barry Wills. All rights reserved. ============================================================================ DISTRIBUTION. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ This product may be freely distributed under the following restrictions: 1. The complete contents of the original archive must remain intact. 2. The original material may in no way be modified. (See P.P.S at the end of this document for extenuation of this term.) 3. This product may not be distributed for profit. A nominal copying fee is authorized (for cost of materials and shipping and handling comparable to that charged by Fred Fish.) 4. Commercial distribution of this product without written permission from the author is forbidden. USE OF THIS PRODUCT. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This product may be used under the following restrictions: 1. Non-commercial use of this product is free of charge. 2. Commercial use of this product without written permission from the author is forbidden. This includes shareware. 3. Honorable mention of the author and product must be included in the client documentation. 4. This product may not be used for malicious intent. DISCLAIMER. ~~~~~~~~~~ This product is provided without any warranty, express or implied. The user of this product assumes full responsibility for any damage resulting from the use and/or misuse of this product. That stated, I would like to add that I have tested this product and I believe it to be reliable. I have used it myself and have had no problems that could be attributed to the software contained in this package. CONTENTS. ~~~~~~~~ This archive should contain the following files: Fill - Executable V0.11b. Fill.doc - Copyright notice and product information (this file). cf - Executable creates a file of any given size. ============================================================================ REQUIREMENTS. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ An Amiga with the minimum configuration. Should not be KickStart sensitive. WHAT IS IT? ~~~~~~~~~~ This is a Beta version. Bug reports are requested. FILL copies or moves all files from the current directory at the time of invocation to a destination (normally a floppy drive) in such a fashion as to waste as little storage as possible. WHY IS IT? ~~~~~~~~~ I was suitably impressed by a program I saw (can you believe it?) on IBM/clone machines called FILL. I hunted for an equivalent (or the source so I could port it) for Amiga but it was unavailable. So I wrote it. This was not just an exercise. I need this program. I often download a lot of files to my hard drive and then peruse through them and classify them later. But sometimes I can't get to them until MUCH later (school gets in the way, etc.) In the meantime if I need space on my drive then I have to manually copy these files to floppy for temporary storage. Both time and floppy diskettes are at a premium. Manually copying takes a lot of time, and diskettes aren't a dime a dozen ($6 - $10 a dozen, actually.) That's where FILL comes to the rescue. USAGE. ~~~~~ 1. Change directory (CD) to the desired source directory. 2. Typing FILL without any parameters (or with invalid parameters) will produce the following message: Usage: Fill [] ') Options: -b## Buffer size in kbytes (1-100; default 20) -c Copy files only, don't delete source (default MOVE FILES) -e## Error margin, add blocks to storage estimate (1-20; default 0) 3. Typing "Fill DF0:" will MOVE all files to the floppy in DF0:. All files moved or copied retain their protection bits. If the diskette in DF0: becomes full the number of unused bytes is displayed and you will be prompted to insert the next diskette. Entering 'Q' or 'q' at the prompt will abort the program. 4. Buffer size is 20k by default. Allowable range is 1k-100k. Using a buffer size of 20 on my machine seemed to work well enough. I've noticed that if you use a buffer that will accommodate half your files you'll get the best thoughput. Using 100k for tiny files does not improve the speed. 5. Program mode is MOVE by default. The option '-c' disables deletion of source files. If an error occurs while writing to destination, the destination file is removed (but the source file is not), a message is displayed and a smaller file will be attempted. (I could not test this feature because I couldn't get FILL to fail. I would like to be notified if this occurs!) 6. Error margin is 0 blocks by default. This option was supplied in the event that storage requirements are incorrectly calculated by the program. This should only occur when attempting to FILL a floppy that isn't empty; in this case fragmentation may occur on an uneven file extension boundary, causing an extra file extension block to be required. I don't yet know how to predict this, so we're stuck using the option until then. (I would greatly appreciate it if someone suggested a source of information.) OTHER CONSIDERATIONS. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ FILL does not check for files on destination that have the same name, they are simply over-written. For this reason, and the probability of file fragmentation, using partially-full disks with this program is discouraged. The storage requirements formula used in this program is not sanctioned (as far as I am aware) by anyone but me. I formulated it by experimentation with DOS. Therefore, it is possible that the calculations may occasionally be inaccurate. If this occurs I would appreciate a bug report and as much information about the circumstances as possible. Redirecting the output of the DOS List command to a text file(s) would be very helpful, as would error messages generated by DOS and the program. Since FILL was written with 880k floppies in mind as the standard destination device, the storage requirements calculation may be inaccurate if you are trying to fill hard/floptical drives or high density drives. I have no need (and no means) to test other media types at this time. If this causes you severe heartburn please let me know and I'll consider researching it. I intentionally did not play with FFS since I don't use it on my floppies. FILL may act a little flakey if used with FFS floppies. ============================================================================ LIMITATIONS. ~~~~~~~~~~~ · Doesn't do subdirectories. · Doesn't do file specifications (wild cards.) · Empty floppies work best. Floppies that have stuff on them already may cause fragmentation on uneven file extension boundaries. This causes innacurate calculation of destination storage requirements. This is the reason for the Error Margin option. I don't have a rule of thumb for the use of this option; it's up to you. · If the destination becomes full during a file transfer the destination file is deleted and a smaller file is attempted (but the source is not deleted.) This should only happen when using a disk that is not empty to start with. If this occurs use the Error Margin option. If it happens while you are using empty floppies, it's a miscalculation and should be reported as a bug. · Any other features not included that you think would be worthwhile... CAVEATS. ~~~~~~~ · I've repeated this caution about using blank disks with FILL. Let me qualify this by saying that FILL should work properly on disks that have been copied to, but not deleted from and recopied-redeleted, or any combination thereof, since deleting and rewriting leave "holes" in disks. FILL should also work on optimized disks. TO DO. ~~~~~ · Ctrl-C interruption handling. · Optimized copying. Comparing combined size of two or three smaller files instead of just using the largest file that will fit. · Handle source file specifications (wild cards.) · Allow specification of an alternate destination drive (for those of us with more than one floppy.) HISTORY. ~~~~~~~ V0.10b - First release, May 1993. ~~~~~~ 1. Locks destination. Doesn't care if it's a floppy. 2. Locks source. Source is always current directory. 3. Examines contents of source directory, stores filenames and sizes in a list in descending order. 4. Checks free space on destination. Gets from list largest file that will fit on destination. Moves file to destination. Continues until list is emptied or files remaining in list won't fit on an empty volume. 5. Prompts for disk-change when volume becomes full. Allows user interruption. 6. Displays number of unused bytes on a finished volume. 7. Supports options: -b## Copy buffer size (1-100k; default 20) -c Copy only. Don't move files. (default MOVE FILES) -e## Error Margin for storage estimate (1-20 blocks; default 0) 8. Preserves file attributes. 9. Recovers from full disk error (untested.) V0.11b - Released . ~~~~~~ 1. Corrected erroneous check for file too big to fit on empty volume. V0.10b would keep asking for another disk, even though a file would not fit on an empty volume. User had to enter 'Q' or 'q' to quit at the prompt. 2. Corrected to get the destination infodata before displaying free space when exiting the program. Previously, the free space shown upon exiting was the free space on the destination BEFORE the last file was copied/moved. (oops) ============================================================================ MISCELLANEOUS. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This product was developed and tested on a Commodore Amiga 500 with the following configuration: KickStart V1.3, WorkBench V1.3, ©Commodore-Amiga, Inc. Amiga E V2.1, ©Wouter van Oortmerssen AZ V1.50, ©Jean-Michel Forgeas DataFlyer 500 SCSI controller Quantum 52M HD Dual 880K floppy drive 1M 16-bit Chip RAM CSA Derringer 030 accellerator: 68030 CPU @25MHz 68881 FPU @27MHz 4M 32-bit Fast RAM ============================================================================ CREDITS. ~~~~~~~ Special thanks go to: · Wouter van Oortmerssen for making Amiga E awesome and available! · Jean-Michel Forgeas and The Software Winery for producing such an outstanding text editor (nice docs, too!) Thanks! You guys are awesome! · Thanks goes also to those who helped me test this thing: Kenny Odle and Mike Whitney. "But," you say, recalling my words, "if time is at such a premium, then why spend a week writing a program that may not save you that time in return?" Well, it's because I eat bytes and I shit bits, so I gotta write SOMETHING. I WANT a program that does what FILL does; I don't particularly feel an urge to author a spreadsheet. Would an artist paint buffalo if he wanted to paint naked women? Besides potential fame and glory (hah-hah-haaaaah!) and the drive to make an unruly beast bow to my wim (hah-hah-haaaaah, HAH-HAH-HAAAAAAH!), it's because of programmers like the guys I just mentioned that I need a program like this. If you LIKE to send money, then don't let me discourage you. Otherwise, you may use FILL under the conditions described above with a clear conscience. ============================================================================ CONTACTING THE AUTHOR. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I can be reached by the following means: Internet: bwills@enterprise.safb.af.mil USnail: Barry Wills 5528D Pryor Dr. Scott AFB, IL 62225 (USA) (618)-744-1096 I wrote this for my own use, but I hope you get as much use out of it as I do. Send mail, money, software, warm weather to the address(es) above. I am very interested in feedback; I will answer all mail. Good luck and enjoy! P.S. - I remember encountering somewhere out there a plea for information concerning the calculation of AmigaDOS file system overhead. I can't locate that poster now, so I can't reply to you, whoever you are. Drop me a line if you're still interested and I'll release that portion of code to you. That offer is open to all. For now I won't go through the hassle of constructing a demo unless someone shows some interest. (Don't worry. E code is fairly readable.) P.P.S - Distributers and users of this program are hereby granted the right to replace the letters of the singly occurring expletive "shit" (now doubly occurring) with asterisks (*), character for character, if it so offends them. This is the only permitted change to the package contents. A package so changed MAY BE DISTRIBUTED IN THAT MODIFIED FORM (although there are some out there who would feel cheated if they couldn't figure out just what that darn word was before somone axed it!) This amendment is intended for the convenience of G-rated BBSs. (Those who get this package in its censored form may contact me and I will reveal to them the original word so they can change it back!) ============================================================================