513 lines
20 KiB
Plaintext
513 lines
20 KiB
Plaintext
From: Digestifier <Linux-Activists-Request@news-digests.mit.edu>
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To: Linux-Activists@news-digests.mit.edu
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Reply-To: Linux-Activists@news-digests.mit.edu
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Date: Sat, 25 Jan 92 13:30:11 EST
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Subject: Linux-Activists Digest #15
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Linux-Activists Digest #15, Volume #1 Sat, 25 Jan 92 13:30:11 EST
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Contents:
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man pages (Ken Block)
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Re: How to boot a PC from drive B: (Bruce H. McIntosh)
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Re: New floppy driver (Bob Smith)
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Re: Minor device numbers. (Jeffrey Comstock)
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Re: linux/mm/memory.c (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
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Re: using Linux and DOS (Robert Duncan)
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Re: Some Questions ... (Robert Duncan)
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FAQ information (Marc CORSINI)
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Re: Found problem with executable shell scripts. (Bob Smith)
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TAR to Multi-volumes (Mont Pierce)
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Problem with Kermit (kevin dahlhaus)
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Re: ARG (hard drive problems) (Doug Dougherty)
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COM3,COM4 and "out of memory" during uncompress. (Usenet)
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----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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From: krb@kingfish.cis.ufl.edu (Ken Block)
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Subject: man pages
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Date: 25 Jan 92 04:40:51 GMT
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Someone posted that their were man pages. Is this true?
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Could someone post ftp sites. I know of
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nic.funet.fi
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tsx-11.mit.edu
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tupac-amaru.informatik.rwth-aachen.de
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------------------------------
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From: bhm@reef.cis.ufl.edu (Bruce H. McIntosh)
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Subject: Re: How to boot a PC from drive B:
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Date: 25 Jan 92 05:00:59 GMT
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If you're into hardware hacking, you can rig a pc to boot from drive B in a
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kind of painless fashion. The pc world tells its A drives from its B drives
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not by means of the drive select jumpers on the drives (in fact, some drives
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no longer even *have* the jumpers, which is a sore blow to a cp/m wizard like
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me :-) ) but by means of that infernal twist in the floppy drive cable. Both
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floppies are jumped as DS1, and the twist in the cable lets the pc do drive
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select and motor on at the same time. The cable goes
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controller ---- drive B ---(twist)--- drive A
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What you need to do is get a 4 pole double throw switch. Pick out the lines
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in the ribbon cable (lines 10-16, I think) and carefully figure out which lines
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have the signals and which are grounds (you don't need to switch the grounds).
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*VERY* carefully separate these lines from the ribbon and splice the switch in,
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wired up as a "reversing switch", something like this:
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from controller 10 -------o o----- 10 to drive B ====x==== to drive A
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X
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16 -------o o----- 16
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12 -------o o----- 12
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X
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14 -------o o----- 14
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(back view of 4pdt switch)
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Flipping the switch has the effect of adding another twist to the cable, which
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will reverse the effect of the twist between the drives, making the former B
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drive to now be the A drive, and vice verse.
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WARNING: This technique *should* work, although now that I think about it,
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it'll blow the mind of your AT's cmos setup; you'll likely have to run the
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setup utility (hopefully, it's in rom) to inform the BIOS that the drives have
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been flopped. If you are the least bit unsure about doing this mod, get a
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new floppy drive cable and perform the modification on *it*. That way, if my
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harebrained scheme doesn't work, you can have the original cable to fall back
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on.
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--
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=============================================================================
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----- -----
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| * | Bruce H. McIntosh __o Now in stereo! | * |
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| O | bhm@cis.ufl.edu \<, | O |
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----- ______________________()/ ()____*****-_-_-__---*\___ -----
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| |
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| "Worthy is the Lamb, who was slain, to receive power and |
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=== wealth and wisdom and strength and glory and praise!" - Rev 5:12 ===
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=============================================================================
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------------------------------
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From: bob@snuffy.dracut.ma.us (Bob Smith)
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Subject: Re: New floppy driver
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Date: 25 Jan 92 04:47:42 GMT
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In article <Jan.23.18.51.40.1992.27911@dumas.rutgers.edu> hedrick@dumas.rutgers.edu (Charles Hedrick) writes:
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> >I uploaded the improved floppy driver to tsx-11.mit.edu, this allows you to
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> >format floppies as well as greatly speeding up reads.
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>
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> As I've reported privately to him, I'm still having the system hang
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> whenever I try to do backups to a floppy. It hangs somewhere in the
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> first 3 disks, at various places. This is becoming critical, since
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> I'm about to move to a larger disk drive, but have no way (short of
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> kermitting them to a Sun over a modem) to back up the old disk before
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> removing it. I've been looking into the problem myself, but I don't
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> know enough about the PC hardware to have much chance of fixing it.
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After installing the new floppy driver I have a different sort of
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problem... The machine reboots when I try to write to a floppy !?!?
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The machine is an Epson NB3s laptop... I haven't had enough time
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yet to see if I could figure out why, just reporting the symptoms...
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--
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\ Bob Smith \ mx: bob@snuffy.dracut.ma.us
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\ 835 Mammoth Rd. \ uucp: ...{ulowell|wang|wybbs}!snuffy!bob
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\ Dracut, MA. 01826 \ office && voice mail: +1 508 670-6712
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------------------------------
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From: jrc@brainiac.mn.org (Jeffrey Comstock)
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Subject: Re: Minor device numbers.
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Date: 24 Jan 92 22:03:44 GMT
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In article <3883@umriscc.isc.umr.edu> bolsen@mcs213h.cs.umr.edu (Brian Olsen) writes:
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>
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>I've just installed mtools, but unfortunately at the moment I can only
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>read high density floppies. From what I read in the 0.12 install
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>documents, I believe I need to mknod my floppy devices differently.
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>What are the minor device numbers for a 360k and a 720k drive?
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>
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>Any other advice would be appreciated.
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>
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>Thanks,
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>Brian Olsen
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The answer is R.T.F.M :-). This info is in docs/INSTALL-0.11 :
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As with harddisk, floppies have device numbers, but this time major = 2
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instead of 3. The minor number is not as easy: it's a composite that
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tells which drive (A, B, C or D) and what type of drive (360kB, 1.2M,
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1.44M etc). The formula is 'minor = type*4+nr', where nr is 0-3 for A-D,
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and type is 2 for 1.2M disks, and 7 for 1.44M disks. There are other
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types, but these should suffice for now.
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Thus if you have a 1.2M A-drive, and want to call it "floppy0", you have
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to tell linux so. This is done with the "mknod" command. mknod takes 4
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paramters: the unix name of the device, a "b" or a "c" depending on
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whether it's a Block of Character device, and the major and minor
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numbers. Thus to make "floppy0" a 1.2M A-drive, you write:
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mknod /dev/floppy0 b 2 8
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b is for Block-device, the 2 is for floppy, and the 8 is 4*2+0, where
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the 2 is 1.2M-drive and the 0 is drive A. Likewise to make a "floppy1"
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device that is a 1.44M drive in B, you write:
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mknod /dev/floppy1 b 2 29
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where 29 = 4*7 + 1. There are a couple of standard names, for users
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that are used to minix (major, minor in parentheses): /dev/PS0 is a
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1.44M in A (2,28), /dev/PS1 a 1.44M in B (2,29), /dev/at0 is a 1.2M in A
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(2,8), /dev/at1 is a 1.2M in B (2,9). Use mknod to make those that fit
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your computer.
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After you have made these special block devices, you can now read a
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floppy under linux. The easiest way to import things into linux is by
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writing a tar-file to a floppy with rawrite.exe, and then using:
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--
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Jeffrey R. Comstock
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CW -. .-. ----- -..
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INET uunet!jhereg.osa.com!/dev/null (EMAIL CURRENTLY BROKEN)
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------------------------------
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From: torvalds@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Linus Benedict Torvalds)
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Subject: Re: linux/mm/memory.c
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Date: 25 Jan 92 10:54:53 GMT
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In article <TYTSO.92Jan25002639@SOS.mit.edu> tytso@athena.mit.edu (Theodore Y. Ts'o) writes:
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>
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>Am I correct is suppose that a consequence of this is that every single
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>dirty page of the parent has to be swapped in during a fork()? If so, I
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>wonder what sort of hit you will take when something like GNU emacs
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>fork()'s. (My GNU emacs on my Vax 3100 workstation is currently
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>weighing in at 5.4 meg.)
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Yes. This is bad, but not /that/ bad: linux only swaps /dirty/ pages: I
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doubt the GNU emacs eceutable pages get dirtied, and are thus just
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reloaded by the demand-loading mechanism (and nothing happens at the
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fork()). But yes, when editing big files (where there are a lot of
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dirty pages) will force a swap-in.
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Swapping was added as a quick hack: it wasn't really meant to extend
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virtual memory to really big values - more just to get gcc working on a
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2M machine, and have that small extra memory when your executables don't
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quite fit. More like a temporary "panic-memory": it linux swaps on a
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more regular basis the algorithms should be changed to something better
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as well, they are rudimentary right now..
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Linus
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------------------------------
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From: duncan@ssdd475a.erim.org (Robert Duncan)
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Subject: Re: using Linux and DOS
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Date: 24 Jan 92 20:21:25 GMT
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In article <1992Jan23.171127.16247@tc.cornell.edu> beers@theory.TC.Cornell.EDU (Jim Beers) writes:
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> ...
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> I would like to try Linux and would be willing to buy a second drive, 80
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> Meg IDE drive, and use it as my second drive and dedicate it to linux.
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> BUT, I would like to keep the original PC working as is.
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> Is this possible? Can I start up with DOS and then switch over to linux?
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This sounds very workable. You can leave your first hard drive alone if
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you are willing to boot from a floppy disk when you wish to run Linux.
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/dev/hd1 - /dev/hd4 are the partitions on the first hard drive, /dev/hd6 -
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/dev/hd9 are on the 2nd. Make 2 or 3 partitions on the 2nd drive, one for
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your main Linux area, one for a root Linux partition, and possibly one for
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swap space. Then edit the boot image to use these areas and write it to a
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floppy for booting. (please read the installation instructions first)
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Boot without a floppy for MSDOS, with the floppy for Linux.
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BTW, 80 meg of disk space should be fine, at least until somebody gets X11r5
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ported...
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--
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p-----------------------------------------------------------------------------q
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| Robert H. Duncan | |
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| Environmental Research Institute of Michigan | |
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| PO Box 134001 | |
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| Ann Arbor, MI 48113-4001 | |
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| (313)994-1200 ext.2880 | |
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| Internet: duncan@erim.org | |
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b-----------------------------------------------------------------------------d
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------------------------------
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From: duncan@ssdd475a.erim.org (Robert Duncan)
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Subject: Re: Some Questions ...
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Date: 24 Jan 92 20:34:09 GMT
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In article <martin.696189581@menaik> martin@cs.UAlberta.CA (Tim Martin; FSO; Soil Sciences) writes:
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> I got LINUX installed, and I got shoelace working, and I have a swap
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> partition. GCC works, kermit works, uemacs works. Great Stuff!
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> But now I have lots of "beginner" questions.
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> ...
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> Question #3: Patching is a new art, to me. If I do the fd patch and the lp
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> patch and the login patch, can I be fairly confident the subsequent patches
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> will work, and that the resultant binary will actually work? I guess this
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> is a general Patch question: is patch fussy about the initial state of
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> the code it is patching?
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Patch is pretty smart about doing the patches, if the patches are what is
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called 'context diffs' (cdiffs). For ordinary diffs, it is more difficult
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to get them to work when the starting files are not as expected. Often this
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means it is time to do hand editing.
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The fd 'patch' is made of complete replacement and new files, you simply put
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them in the right places and recompile. The lp patch uses ordinary diffs,
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and at least on my system, required hand editing to work. (comment out 2
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references to a non-existing include file and fix a makefile) I can't tell
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you about the login patch, but I did the other two last night, and they
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don't interfere with each other.
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--
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p-----------------------------------------------------------------------------q
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| Robert H. Duncan | |
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| Environmental Research Institute of Michigan | |
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| PO Box 134001 | |
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| Ann Arbor, MI 48113-4001 | |
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| (313)994-1200 ext.2880 | |
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| Internet: duncan@erim.org | |
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b-----------------------------------------------------------------------------d
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------------------------------
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From: corsini@numero6.greco-prog.fr (Marc CORSINI)
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Subject: FAQ information
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Reply-To: corsini@labri.greco-prog.fr
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Date: Sat, 25 Jan 1992 16:45:29 GMT
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Hi Linuxers!
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My site recieved alt.os.linux since yesterday and the messages are
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dated from 19th Jan. :), so I follow the discussion on
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alt.os.linux only via the digests (Hope this will end in 1 or 2 weeks).
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I plan to post the FAQ at the end of the 1st week of each month in two
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ways.
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1) in Cdiff form (not before marsh 'cause the FAQ is not stable at all
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and the Cdiff is twice bigger than the whole)
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2) in whole form especially for new incomers.
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And also the Cdiff updated, one or two weeks after each new version of
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Linux is available.
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Please suggest any change, rephrasing, deletions, new questions,
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answers ...
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Please include "FAQ" in the subject of messages sent to /me/ about
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FAQ, not to the newsgroup since right now I get ONLY digests.
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Please use corsini@labri.greco-prog.fr whatever will be the From part
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of this message.
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Thanks in advance,
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Marc <corsini@labri.greco-prog.fr>
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PS1:
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Remind the vote in Feb. 18th for comp.os.linux
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PS2:
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At the moment the FAQ content looks like
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I. LINUX GENERAL INFORMATION
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II. LINUX USEFUL ADRESSES
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III. INSTALLATION and SECURITY
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IV. LINUX and DOS
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V. SOME CLASSICAL PROBLEMS
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VI. INSTALLATION HINTS
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VII. FEATURES
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------------------------------
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From: bob@snuffy.dracut.ma.us (Bob Smith)
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Subject: Re: Found problem with executable shell scripts.
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Date: 25 Jan 92 15:07:59 GMT
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In article <1992Jan25.050248.16436@cseg03.uark.edu> dws@cseg03.uark.edu (David W. Summers) writes:
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>
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> I found the work-around for problem that I was having. As you might recall,
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> I tried to execute a shell script 'configure' and it had execute permissions
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> and had:
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>
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> #!/bin/sh
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>
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> as the first line (a lot of you asked me to make sure about this).
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>
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> Well, BASH said 'file or directory not found' or something like that.
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>
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> Well, I found out that if I changed it to:
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>
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> #!/usr/bin/sh
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>
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> then it works fine! What seems to be happening is that BASH is NOT following
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> symbolic links! I have /bin -> /usr/bin, with 'sh' in /usr/bin. With
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> everything else I've tested, it follows the symbolic links, but apparently not
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> on the above. Any ideas? Should I just grab the current version of BASH
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> and re-compile? Is this a "feature" or a "bug"?
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>
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Bug or feature? I'm not sure, but the kind of behavior you're refering
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to I can emulate with the Bourne shell in SunOS 3.5 ... So it must be
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kinda normal ??!!?? :-)
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--
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\ Bob Smith \ mx: bob@snuffy.dracut.ma.us
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\ 835 Mammoth Rd. \ uucp: ...{ulowell|wang|wybbs}!snuffy!bob
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\ Dracut, MA. 01826 \ office && voice mail: +1 508 670-6712
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------------------------------
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From: mont@netcom.netcom.com (Mont Pierce)
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Subject: TAR to Multi-volumes
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Reply-To: mont@netcom.netcom.com (Mont Pierce)
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Date: Sat, 25 Jan 1992 17:23:16 GMT
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I use the tar that came with linux and have no problems backing up
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to multiple volumes. You do have to specify the right options:
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tar -ML 1440 -cvf /dev/fd0 [filenames]
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-M = multiple volumes
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-L = volume length is 1440 blocks
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Type " tar + help" to get a full list of options. The "-b" option comment
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is wrong though. It says "-b n block size is n*512 (defualt n=20)",
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default n is really 2 not 20.
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Only problem I've noticed is that if I use the "-z" option it doesn't
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seem to save any data on the diskette. I've tested this by doing the
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following:
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tar -ML 1440 -zcvf tarfile [filenames]
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When the tar command prompts for the next diskette I switched to another
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window to look at the size of the "tarfile". The tar file was smaller
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then 1474560 bytes. This indicates that tar reads the same amount of data
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whether or not compressing the output. So using compress or not to do
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backups to diskette doesn't matter. I had hoped that it would stuff more
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data onto each diskette and thus use less diskettes. Oh well.
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Mont@netcom.com
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------------------------------
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From: dahlhaus@news.cis.ohio-state.edu (kevin dahlhaus)
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Subject: Problem with Kermit
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Date: Sat, 25 Jan 1992 17:35:33 GMT
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Since others have gotten kermit working, this is a problem
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that probably stems from my lack of unix experience, but..
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Linux returns the error: "Warning, Read access to lock directory denied."
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When I try "set line /dev/tty65" to set the serial port. Any ideas
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as to what I am doing wrong?
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Thanks very much,
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=======================================================================
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Kevin P. Dahlhausen dahlhaus@cis.ohio-state.edu
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TIS ap096@po.cwru.edu
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------------------------------
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From: valley@gsbsun.uchicago.edu (Doug Dougherty)
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Crossposted-To: comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d
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Subject: Re: ARG (hard drive problems)
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Date: 25 Jan 92 17:59:26 GMT
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mgjones@miavx1.acs.muohio.edu (Mike 'Felix' Jones) writes:
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>BootAny is probably residing in the first 2 sectors of your harddrive
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>where the partition information is. If you want to get rid of
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>BootAny for good, and you don't need the information currently on the
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>drive, you should low-level format the drive. That should remove any
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>program anywhere on the drive. (see your drive manual or the supplier
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>on how to low-level format it, or pick up one of the programs floating
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>around that will do it for you).
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As an aside, I often wonder what people with IDE drives do in these
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situations. The ability to low-level format a drive is often a boon,
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when you really want to start over from scratch. That's why my motto is
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"MFM forever!".
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But seriously, folks, there must be some kind of util that does
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everything except the actual physical low-level formatting, for IDE
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(& perhaps other non-formattable) drives.
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--
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- And many dragons - had felt the might - of the smite -
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- of the righteous Sir Greenbaum. -
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------------------------------
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From: usenet@kth.se (Usenet)
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Subject: COM3,COM4 and "out of memory" during uncompress.
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Date: 25 Jan 92 17:51:49 GMT
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I now got Linux running on my 386SX computer with 4 Mbyte memory, it seems
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to work just fine.
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However I have a couple of questions:
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I have 3 serial ports on my computer (internal modem, mouse, and to another
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computer) which I use when I am running MS-DOS on it (bad habit :-).
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I dont't want to reconfiguring the hardware every time I want to use modem
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etc in Linux. Does the driver supports COM3 and COM4 ? Or has one to change
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the kernel ?
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When I tried to uncompress a 500k file a got "out of memory" (or
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something like that) message. is this normal ? I have no swap space.
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Mattis Andersson
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mattis@elixir.lne.kth.se
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------------------------------
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** FOR YOUR REFERENCE **
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The service addresse, to which questions about the list itself and requests
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to be added to or deleted from it should be directed, is:
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Internet: Linux-Activists-Request@NEWS-DIGESTS.MIT.EDU
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You can send mail to the entire list (and alt.os.linux) via:
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Internet: Linux-Activsts@NEWS-DIGESTS.MIT.EDU
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Linux may be obtained via one of these FTP sites:
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nic.funet.fi pub/OS/Linux
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tsx-11.mit.edu pub/linux
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tupac-amaru.informatik.rwth-aachen.de pub/msdos/replace
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The current version of Linux is 0.12, released on Jan 14, 1992
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End of Linux-Activsts Digest
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******************************
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