BRU (Backup and Restore Utility) Amiga Version Alpha 1 Release Notes by Fred Fish ************************************************************************ * * * Copyright (c) 1984 Fred Fish * * All Rights Reserved * * * * This software and/or documentation is released for public * * distribution for personal, non-commercial use only. * * Limited rights to use, modify, and redistribute are hereby * * granted for non-commercial purposes, provided that all * * copyright notices remain intact and all changes are clearly * * documented. The author makes no warranty of any kind with * * respect to this product and explicitly disclaims any implied * * warranties of merchantability or fitness for any particular * * purpose. * * * * You may freely copy and redistribute this Alpha 1 test/demo * * version of bru. It may be uploaded to any information service * * except those that attempt to claim copyright on individual * * uploads. * * * ************************************************************************ GENERAL ------- This is the first (and last) freely redistributable version of bru for the Amiga. The Alpha 1 release is a vanilla port of the Unix version, with very little knowledge of the Amiga environment. It is intended for DEMO PURPOSES ONLY. Although I have no reason to suspect any problems with it, please do not use it to back up critical data. I am providing this version without any support whatsoever... With this version you should have received the following files: README This file. Its length is supposed to be 10429 bytes. bru This is the bru executable, compiled with Manx beta version 3.30E in 32-bit int mode, and without internal debugging enabled. It's length is supposed to be 57204 bytes. bru.1 This is the nroff source for the manual page. Its length is supposed to be 24879 bytes. bru.man This is the preformatted version of the manual page for the Unix version of bru. Its length is supposed to be 38705 bytes. brutab This is a file which describes various archive devices. It should be placed in your s: directory, or bru will complain about not being able to find it. Its length is supposed to be 98 bytes. BETA TEST PROGRAM ----------------- If you have a real need to use bru before its first real commercial release, I suggest that you become a registered Beta tester. This gives you the following advantages: (1) First and foremost, I will listen to your problems and try to help you if you have any difficulties with the forthcoming beta versions. (2) You will automatically receive periodic updates of the Beta versions of bru, as major changes and/or bug fixes are made. I anticipate new releases every 2-6 weeks as it transmorgifies into an honest to goodness Amiga program. (3) At the end of the Beta test period, you will either receive a refund of any unused portion of your registration fee (see below) if bru is bundled with hardware shipped by drive manufacturers, or credit towards the commercial version if it becomes an independent product. (4) Beta test versions will include a copy of "compress", which can be used to compress an entire archive, after writing an archive to a normal disk file. The results compare quite well with using the "arc" program to archive and compress a set of files. There is a $30 fee to become a registered beta tester. Each time you receive an update disk with the latest beta version, $6 is subtracted from your balance. Should it become necessary to extend the beta period past 5 updates, I will bear the cost of sending additional update disks, up to a maximum of 3 additional disks. If for some reason I choose to discontinue development, your balance will be refunded, or optionally applied towards future disks in my Freely Redistributable Library. To register, send your request and registration fee to: Fred Fish 1346 W. 10th Place Tempe, Arizona 85281 (602) 921-1113 Note that you may NOT redistribute copies of your beta versions without explicit written permission. The only way you can legally possess a copy of any version other than Alpha release 1 (this release) is by becoming a registered beta tester, receiving it from a drive manufacturer authorized to redistribute it, or by waiting for some sort of commercial release. SOME THINGS TO NOTE ------------------- (1) If you do not explicitly specify any files to backup on the command line, bru will backup the current directory by default. As as special case, specifying '-' as the file list will cause bru to read the list of files from its standard input. bru 1:50 bru -xvf df0: -> 1:35 Thus it may be faster to build the ram disk like you want it, and archive it to floppies using bru. Then after booting, use bru to initialize the ram disk from the stored archive. KNOWN DEFICIENCIES ------------------ This is a list of problems that are currently known and will be fixed in the Beta versions. Note that they are mostly Amiga specific problems, not deficiencies in the original Unix design. (1) The Alpha 1 version opens a special window to write it's output to, and requests for explicit closing when done. This was a side effect of the fact that I couldn't get it to properly interact with the CLI window it was invoked from, under Manx C. I could write a sample program that did the interaction I wanted, but when it was installed in bru it simply didn't work. I could not seem to track down the problem easily, so I punted and had it open it's own window. The intent is that bru be invokable from both a CLI and from Workbench via an icon. When invoked from the CLI it will interact (if necessary) with the user via the CLI window, just like on a Unix system. When invoked from workbench it will use a full amiga interface (yet to be designed and integrated). A side effect of this is that in order to terminate bru via ^C, you currently need to switch back to the CLI window to type ^C, and the bru window does NOT automatically go away (until reboot). Normally bru cleans up properly after itself, but the Alpha version needs a loving parent to do the job... When interrupted, the Unix version continues to write out the current file and properly terminate the archive, leaving everything consistent. The Alpha Amiga version simply quits whereever it is, leaving any resources unreclaimed, and an inconsistent archive (if writing). Also, the interaction window processes raw keystrokes, without ANY editing option. Since it will eventually be eliminated, I haven't fixed it. And yet another glitch, output (which normally would come out on stdout) cannot be redirected to a file, or even halted by pressing any key. This makes "bru -h" kind of useless in the Alpha version. (2) When switching media (floppies) you must wait for AmigaDos to finish playing with the new disk before allowing bru to proceed (by typing return to the prompt). Otherwise, unpredictable results will occur. Usually bru will recover gracefully. Usually... (3) There is currently no option to format floppies on the fly, while writing out archives. They must be preformatted, or formatted via another CLI while bru waits. (4) The Alpha version completely ignores the newly documented "file-archived" bit in the permissions word. (5) The Alpha version completely ignores any file comment. (6) The Alpha version completely ignores the delete bit in the permissions word. The rwe bits are turned into Unix rwx bits, for Unix user, group, and other. (7) This version does not pre-compress files before archiving. (8) Because of design considerations, which I won't go into here, the archive format is relatively inefficient. This is not insignificant on the Amiga, given the tendency to have lots of little .info files laying around. For example, because each archive block is 2K, a one byte file takes up 4K on the archive device (2K for the file header block and 2K for the first data block). The advantages of the format include extensive data redundancy and built in self-consistency checks. Note that bru archives written to a normal file and compressed with "compress", generally shrink to about 30% of their former size, which is significant for transmission via modem. (9) Normally bru wants to preserve file dates when extracting from archives (in general, every attempt is made to make a file look exactly like the original archived file). The Alpha version does not preserve any file dates on extraction. I understand there is now a supported method of setting the file datestamp, and this will be fixed in the beta versions. (10) The Unix version of bru depends on the shell to expand filename patterns during file creation. Since the CLI does not do this, you must use one of the csh like programs to get this same effect on the Amiga with the Alpha version. Both the Unix version and the Amiga Alpha version can expand filename patterns during file extraction. I.E., "bru -xvf df1: include/local/*.h" should work as expected. Bru will eventually accept filename patterns on the Amiga for all modes. Whether or not this follows standard Amiga conventions or Unix shell conventions is still undecided. NOTES TO HARD DISK DISTRIBUTERS ------------------------------- If you wish to bundle either the beta or final commercial version of bru with your drives, please contact me for details. UNIX VERSIONS ------------- The Unix version of this program is available and will read/write archives compatible with the Amiga version. Unlimited OEM binary distribution licenses and individual site source licenses are available with very attractive terms. -Fred 26-Dec-86