I aplogize if this is PARTIALLY off topic (not totally, since some of the
tests I describe were done on two Alphas).
I recently had the need to distribute on CD (a single copy for backup) some
s/w developed on Windows NT. The primary target system will also be NT
(actually we would be shipping our computers to the receiving institution).
The distribution encloses not only binaries, but also some ASCII files (like
HTML or Postscript files), which can be read elsewhere (the receiving
institution has a large park of Suns and HPs).
So let's say the target of the CD will be 95% Win NT and 5% Unix.
In the past I created all my CDs (backup of my Alpha Unix files for re-use on
Unix), on a Sun using the GEAR s/w. In such case I used ISO9660 with Rock
Ridge info and name translation, single session mode, normal CDROM format.
This time I thought it was preferable to create the CDs on a Windows machine,
because I was afraid that ftp'ing the files on Unix could mess up file names
or file content. Thus I moved all stuff on a colleague's PC and used HP
Adapted Easy CD Creator.
I selected the option labelled "click here to create a data CD for
distribution among different types of computers".
The first time I used the default options, and obtained a CD which, analysed
with GEAR, appears to be a CDROM-XA, multisession
Disc (type XA) contains 1 tracks and 2 sessions.
First writable logical address: 53578.
Session 1: track 1: start 00-02-00 (LBN 0), MODE2, size 42178.
Session 2: unfinished, start 11-56-28 (LBN 53578).
A second time I tried to look into setup options of Easy CD creator. One menu
offers the option of "JOLIET" and "ISO9660" file system. I do not know what
"Joliet" is, but apparently it's the only one which supports long names
(although Rock Ridge is not mentioned anywhere). So I used this option, but
selected normal CDROM type and single session.
This is confirmed by GEAR analysis to be alike all my previous CDs created by
GEAR on Unix, i.e. a proprely fixated disk.
Disc (type CDROM) contains 1 tracks and 1 sessions.
Session 1: track 1: start 00-02-00 (LBN 0), MODE1, size 42174.
Lead out start 09-24-24.
I then tried to access both CDs on different systems, and the results are the
same for both the XA and CDROM disks, namely :
(1) a Win NT system reads the disk perfectly (sees long names etc.)
(2) my Alpha with DU 3.2 gives "/dev/rz4c on /cdrom: I/O error" when
mounting the disk with my usual command
"mount -r -t cdfs -o rrip,noversion /dev/rz4c /cdrom"
(3) a colleague's Alpha with Tru64 5.0 reads the disk perfectly and
sees long names (so I presume Rock Ridge info is there and OK).
(4) a Sun with Solaris 2.5 (and volume management, the disk is mounted
automatically) sees the CD, but the file names are truncated to
8.3 "DOS" names. Although the same Sun reads perfectly my GEAR-created
Rock Ridge disks.
(5) I had no opportunity to test the CD on an HP-UX machine.
Can anybody knowing the differences between DU 3.2 and Tru64 5.0 shed light
on the different behaviour, and on the presumable nature of the CD ?
Ideally, if somebody could also give hints about settings to use in Easy CD
Creator to generate CD's readable on all Unixes, that would be very
appreciated !
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Lucio Chiappetti - IFCTR/CNR - via Bassini 15 - I-20133 Milano (Italy)
For more info :
http://www.ifctr.mi.cnr.it/~lucio/personal.html
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Received on Fri Jun 30 2000 - 12:36:11 NZST