Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!ucbvax!UBVMS.BITNET!V112PDL5
From: V112PDL5@UBVMS.BITNET
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple
Subject: Re: GS/OS Questions
Message-ID: <8809250200.aa24236@SMOKE.BRL.MIL>
Date: 25 Sep 88 00:30:00 GMT
Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 71

Quotes by Keith Rollin:
>As for Mac disk support, it doesn't currently transparently read Mac disks, but
>the potential is certainly there. GS/OS performs ALL device reads through
>FSTs (File System Translators) and RAM based device drivers. A 3.5" drive
>device driver is already included with GS/OS, but there is no HFS FST. The
>FSTs currently supplied are ProDOS, High Sierra, and Console - an FST for
>character I/O to the screen and from the keyboard.

  The words "3.5" device driver" coming from Apple makes me nervous
as an owner of a non-Apple hard drive. Remember Apple's  printer driver for
the Mac was so complex that (at first) one printer manufacturer switched to
selling Imagewriter compatibles to avoid the trouble of writing their own
drivers.

  In a correction the CMS hard disks CAN be used with an Apple SCSI
controller. In fact that's the only way it can be used with System 4's
partitioning software. Apparently you'll either have to:
    a) buy an Apple SCSI card
    b) wait for Apple to support the CMS SCSI card
    c) wait for CMS to write a driver
I got this information indirectly (via Joe Craparotta) from the horse's
mouth: CMS.

Apparently you can create multiple 32 megabyte volumes o' ProDOS. Actually I
thought it was quite stupid of Apple to allow one to buy a 40 Mb HD and waste
the upper 8. Of course since CMS already allows partitioning up to a 60 Mb HD.
So who cares unless you want to partion your drive in one of the other
formats or like very, very big HDs.

  Look at these quotes from Volume 10, Issue 38 of InfoWorld about GS/OS:
"[GS/OS comes]...with an application model that increases its similarity to
the Mac." and "The new OS lets files have data and resource forks, the
same structure used in Mac applications." At first this seemed that Apple
would phaze out ProDOS in favor of Mac HFS (something I would like to see)
making massive changes to APW in the process. But GS/OS doesn't even support
HFS. I have heard nothing of this since I've read it though. Hmmmm.... Keith
do you know something I don't?

>Volumes of greater than 32Meg ARE supported by GS/OS, per se, but NOT by the
>ProDOS FST that most people will be using. This is due to limitations of the
>ProDOS system since it was created. However, the limit on file and volume
>sizes imposed by GS/OS is something like 4 GBytes!!! This means that you can
>also access filing systems like High Sierra and HFS that can create volumes and
>files of this size.

  By the bye, our local (North East) Apple dealer trainer (whatever his real
title is) mentioned that initially Apple had developed software enabling GSs
to serve as File Servers over AppleShare, but it was dumped citing abysmal
performance. With the faster GS/OS may this decision be revised? It kind of
hurts one's pride.
  Of course at the same time he stated High Sierra was a "error-correcting
protocol for CDs" and refused to believe the GS runs at 2.5/2.8 Mhz rather
than the 2.0 Mhz he stated in his presentation. I know that it may not be
such a big thing not to know the speed of one's company's machine but to
spread the wrong information?

  I find it quite ironic that Apple chose to give the GS the capablity to
read the CD-ROM ISO standared before they gave it to the Mac. The Mac could
not read ISO when the CD-ROM first came out. Of course System 6.0, 6.1, and
6.2 have came out since, so maybe that's not true. But if it is that would
mean we got Applelink *AND* ISO before the Mac. I bet all those Mac owners are
green with envy.

  Hey Keith! Will HFS be supported in GS OS/2? :-)

>Keith Rollin                                               amdahl\
>Developer Technical Support                           pyramid!sun !apple!keith
>Apple Computer                                             decwrl/
>"You can do what you want to me, but leave my computer alone!"

                           - mark cromwell