BFRONT --- A BackupST frontend F.J.R. Appelman, University of Utrecht, 3D Computer Vision Research Group, The Netherlands. email: fred@cv.ruu.nl 1. Info Bfront is a frontend for the BackupST program. This program makes is possible for novice users to use the powerfull posibilities of the BackupST program. This document will not give a description and/or explanation of the BackupST program. A separate document describes the BackupST program. 2. Starting the program Start the application (Bfront) by double clicking from the desktop. The resource file resource.rsc must be present in the same folder as the Bfront program. If present the default settings of the program will be read form the file bfront.dat. If the file is not present, this will be silently ignored. A welcom box will be presented for the period of 1.5 seconds. During this time the mouse is disabled. After the welcom box, a permanent box is drawn on the desktop. The program is always started in List mode. Bfront is a frontend to the BackupST program. The BackupST program will have its own screen memory during execution. You can toggle between the Bfront screen and the BackupST screen by using the ESC. The BackupST program has both a mouse and a keyboard interface. The keyboard commands (keycommand) are an equivalent to the mouse commands. The ESC is the only keycommand which does not have a mouse equivalent. 3. DESK +-------------------------------------------------------+ | Desk File Mode General Backup Restore | +-------------------------------------------------------+ | About Bfront ... | +------------------+ In the DESK-menu you can get information about the Bfront. It will inform you that Bfront is free of charge. I don't believe in the share-ware concept. 4. FILE +-----------------------------------------------------------------------+ Desk File Mode General Backup Restore | +-----------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Start Selected mode | S | |-----------------------------------| | Save default configuration | ^D | | Read configuration | ^R | | Save configuration | ^S | |-----------------------------------| | Quit | ^Q | +-----------------------------------+ 4.1 Start selected mode This will start the BackupST program. The first time Bfront is started, this entry of the menu will not be enabled. If the current mode (See Section 5) is List or Restore this menu entry is enabled if the location of the BackupST program is defined (See Subsection 6.4). If the mode is Backup both the location of the BackupST program and the data to be stored (See Subsection 7.5) have to be specified before this menu entry is enabled. This action can also be started by the keycommand ALT-S. 4.2 Save default configuration This will store the current configuration under the name bfront.dat. This configuration will automatically be read (See Section 2) the next time Bfront is started. In the configuration file the following items are stored: -x- Verbosity (See 6.1) -x- Sectors per track (See 6.2) -x- Tracks per side (See 6.3) -x- The path to BackupST (See 6.4) -x- The used drive (See 6.5) -x- The used floppy type (See 6.6) -x- Archive bit mode (See 7.1) -x- Verify mode (See 7.2) -x- Backup mode (See 7.3) -x- Format mode (See 7.4) -x- The backup path (See 7.5) -x- The restore date mode (See 8.1) -x- The overwrite mode (See 8.2) -x- The interactive mode (See 8.3) -x- The create directories mode (See 8.4) -x- The restore path (See 8.6) The mode is always set to List if the program is started. Error recovery mode is always turned off. This action can also be started by the keycommand CTRL-D. 4.3 Read configuration ... This will read a user specified configuration file from disk. This new configuration will take effect immediatly. This action can also be started by the keycommand CTRL-R. 4.4 Save configuration ... This will save the current configuration under a user specified name. This action can also be started by the keycommand CTRL-S. 4.5 Quit This will quit Bfront. No confirmation is asked. This action can also be started by the keycommand CTRL-Q. 5. Mode +-----------------------------------------------------+ | Desk File Mode General Backup Restore | +-----------------------------------------------------+ | List | L | | Restore | R | | Backup | B | +--------------+ The BackupST has 3 modes in which it works. 5.1 List This will set BackupST in List mode. In this mode you can list the contents of an existing archive. This selection will disable the Backup (See Section 7) and Restore (See Section 8) menu. This action can also be started by the keycommand ALT-L. 5.2 Restore This will set BackupST in Restore mode. In Restore mode you can extract files from an existing archive. This selection will disable the Backup (See Section 7) and enable the Restore (See Section 8) menu. This action can also be started by the keycommand ALT-R. 5.3 Backup This will set BackupST in Backup mode. In this mode you can create a new archive. This selection will enable the Backup (See Section 7) and disable the Restore (See Section 8) menu. This action can also be started by the keycommand ALT-B. 6. General +----------------------------------------------------------+ | Desk File Mode General Backup Restore | +----------------------------------------------------------+ | Verbosity ... | | No. Sectors/Track ... | | No. Tracks/Side... | | Backupst path... | |-----------------------| | Drive A | | Drive B | |-----------------------| | Single Sided | | Double Sided | +-----------------------+ 6.1 Verbosity ... The verbosity controls the amount of noise the BackupST program creates. This is more a debug feature than a normal feature. Normal users should keep it at a value of '0' which is the default value. The verbosity value ranges from ``0'' to ``9''. 6.2 No. Sectors/Track ... This controls the number of sector on a track. The only valid values are '9' and '10' sectors per track. If you restore or list an archive this value is overruled by information stored in the archive. 6.3 No. Tracks/Side ... This controls the number of tracks on a side. The only valid values are 80--84 tracks per side. If you restore or list an archive this value is overruled by information stored in the archive. 6.4 BackupST path ... The backupst path is the path to the BackupST program. This option has to be selected before the BackupST program can be started. Once you've selected the program you should store the path in the default configuration file (See Section 4.2). 6.5 Drive selection You can either select Drive A or Drive B. A checkmark is set before the selection. 6.6 Floppy type selection You can either select Single sided or Double sided floppies. A checkmark is set before the selection. 7.0 Backup +------------------------------------------------------------+ | Desk File Mode General Backup Restore | ---------------------------+-----------------------+---------+ | Set archived bit | | Verify on | | Full backup | |-----------------------+ | Always | | On error | | Never | |-----------------------+ | Backup path ... |  P | +-----------------------+ 7.1 Set archived bit If this menu entry has a checkmark, the archived bit will be set during the backup process. This bit indicates that a file has been archived. The incremental (See Subsection 7.3) backup relies on this feature. Turning off the process of setting the archived bit will make it possible to make multiple incremental backups. ``Setting'' the archived bit is a little bit symbolic since TOS 1.4 is introduced. The introduction of TOS 1.4 inverted the meaning of the archived bit. Before TOS 1.4 the bit was set to ``1'' to indicate the file was archived. Before TOS 1.4 this bit was automatically cleared by the OS once the file was changed. Since the introduction of TOS 1.4 this bit is set to ``0'' to indicate the file is archived. In TOS 1.4 this bit is set to ``1'' by the OS if the file is changed. BackupST will automatically adjust its behavior to the present TOS version. 7.2 Verify on If this menu entry has a checkmark, every tracks that is written will be verified. This option will slow down the backup-process, but will increase the reliability. 7.3 Full backup If this menu entry has a checkmark, BackupST will make a full backup. A full backup means that every file will be stored in the archive, without checking the archived bit. If the menu entry does not have a checkmark, this means that an incremental backup will be made. During an incremental backup only files from which the archived bit is cleared (See Subsection 7.1) will be stored in the archive. 7.4 Format mode Three different formats are supported. -x- Never Never format a track. If a disk I/O error occurs, BackupST is aborted with an error message. -x- Always Format every track before trying to write on the track. After formatting of the track the behavior of BackupST is as if format On error was selected. -x- On error Format a track if an I/O error occurs. After formatting of this track, writing to the track is tried again. Up to 5 retries will take place. If the retries have no effect, BackupST is aborted. When every track needs reformatting, it turns out to be a time consuming proces. If more than 3 tracks need formatting on a particular side of a disk the remaining tracks on that side will be formatted before trying to write on that side. 7.5 Backup path ... Enter a space seperated list of the ``files'' to be archived. Files can be: 1. Plain files. 2. directories 3. disks 4. regular expressions Slashes (/) are automatically converted to backslashes (\). Relative addressing is supported. Regular expressions are full regular expressions, not the GEMDOS regular expressions. This action can also be started by the keycommand ALT-P. 8. Restore +---------------------------------------------------+ Desk File Mode General Backup Restore | +---------------------------------------------------+ | Restore file dates | | Overwrite silently | | Interactive mode | | Create Directories | | Error recovery ... | | Restore Path |  P | +--------------------+ 8.1 Restore file dates If the menu entry has a checkmark, the original creation date will be restored. After writing to the file to harddisk, the creation date is set to ``today''. With this option enabled the creation date is restored to the original date. 8.2 Overwrite silently Overwrite existent files silently. Normally BackupST will not overwrite an existing file without asking permission to do so. If you enable this option, BackupST will overwrite all files without asking. 8.3 Interactive mode If this option is enabled, BackupST will go into interative mode. It will first read the archive index, and then enter a little subshell. The following command are available: -x- ls [directory] -x- dir [directory] This command will list the contents of a directory. If you don't specify a directory, the current directory is listed by instead. By default, no files are extracted in interactive mode. Only the files specifically 'added' (see command add) by the user are extracted. Files to be extracted are marked by a '+'. Directories are marked by a '\'. Directories are never marked by a '+', only the contents of a directory is. If you list the contents of a directory, you see the contents of a fictive disk. There is absolute no relation with the current contents of the hard disk. This so fictive disk has a root directory under which all disks are mounted. If you type 'ls' at the root level you probably only see the volume label(s) of the disks you have stored in this archive. If only one 'disk' is available, an automatic 'cd disk' will be done when the program is started. -x- ll [directory] The 'll' command will make a long directory listing. (see ls) -x- quit -x- stop -x- exit This will abort the program without extracting the marked files. -x- help [command] -x- h [command] This command gives a list of all commands available. If an argument is given, an explanation of this command is given. -x- cd [directory] -x- chdir [directory] Change directory to 'directory'. If no argument is given, the new directory is the root directory of the ramdirectory. -x- add [files] Add files to the list of files to be extracted. If the argument is a directory, all files in this directory are added to the list. Regular expressions are also valid. Added files are marked by a '+' in front of the filename in a 'ls' command. (see 'ls') -x- rm [files] Opposite of add command. Same syntax. -x- extract -x- retrieve -x- go Retrieve all marked files from the archive. 8.4 Create directories If this option is enabled, the files restored from the archive will retain their directory hierarchy by creating directories as needed. This is the normal behavior. If you don't create subdirectories the files wwhich are restored will be stored at the root disk of the ``original'' disk the files were located on. This command is usually used in conjuction with the restore path (See Subsection 8.6) option. Suppose you set the restore path to d:/tmp. If you now restore a single directory (e.g. c:/bin/mwc) from the archive (You will need interactive mode for this feature), and you don't create subdirectories, you can restore the files in this directory in d:/tmp. Within the directory d:/tmp no new directories will be created. If needed the directory d:/tmp will be created. 8.5 Error recovery ... This wil set BackupST in Error recovery mode. In this mode you can try to restore an existing archive if the main archive index is damaged. In this mode an attempt is made to read the backup archive index. 8.6 Restore path ... Set an alternate root for the restore action. If this option is used, BackupST will not write back the data at the position it was originally stored. Suppose you have stored a directory named 'c:/bin'. If you restore the data with a restore path of d:/tmp, the data will be restored at d:/tmp/bin. The directory structure will be maintained. This action can also be started by the keycommand ALT-P.