221 lines
12 KiB
HTML
221 lines
12 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
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<head>
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<title>CiderPress FAQ</title>
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<meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="en-us">
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<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
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<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" />
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<link href="main.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
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</head>
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<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000">
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<h1>CiderPress FAQ</h1>
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<p>Some common questions and solutions. <a href="index.htm">Return to main
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page</a>.</p>
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<h3>Why can't I open my MicroDrive CF card?</h3>
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<p>If the CF card was previously formatted for
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Windows or a digital camera, it may still look like a valid volume,
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and Windows will assign a drive letter to it even though the card holds
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nothing but Apple II data. It may even allow you to try to open files with
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garbled names. If try to use the CiderPress Open Device or Volume Copier
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features by selecting the drive letter, you won't see your Apple II data.</p>
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<p>All you need to do is open the card as a physical (numbered) device
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rather than a logical (lettered) device. Better yet, update the CF card
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with the newer version of the MicroDrive utilities; this will clear out the
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Windows volume data so the problem (and some others) don't arise.</p>
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<h3>How do I transfer my Apple II disks to my PC?</h3>
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<p>This isn't something that CiderPress currently helps with. There are,
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however, a number of useful utilities, as well as sites with disk images.
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Check the <a href="http://apple2.org.za/gswv/a2zine/faqs/A2FAQs1START.html">comp.sys.apple2
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FAQ</a> site for information, especially
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<a href="http://apple2.org.za/gswv/a2zine/faqs/Csa2T1TCOM.html">this section</a>.
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ADT is probably the most popular program, but using ShrinkIt
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to create disk images and transferring them over a null modem cable or AppleTalk
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network works too.</p>
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<p>If you have a SuperDrive or floptical drive on your Apple II, you can read
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and write 1.4MB floppy disks. To copy disk images, just create images with ShrinkIt, copy them
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to a 1.4MB ProDOS-formatted floppy, then copy the disk images off with
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CiderPress. If
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you're planning to use them with an emulator right away, copy them off with the
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"bulk" disk image converter so that they'll be in the format your
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emulator prefers.</p>
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<p>While CiderPress supports ProDOS-formatted 720KB and 1.4MB 3.5" floppy
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disks, it cannot support 800KB 3.5" disks or 140K 5.25" disks due to
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limitations of the disk drives used on PCs. (A program called "<a href="http://www.oldskool.org/disk2fdi/">disk2fdi</a>"
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provides some support for reading 5.25" and 3.5" Apple II disks on the
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PC.)</p>
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<h3>How do I transfer disk images to physical disks on a real Apple II?</h3>
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<p>You need to convert the disk image to a format accepted by software on the
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Apple II and then transfer it over. Check the links in the previous answer
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-- software that helps you copy disk images to the PC will usually help you copy
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them back. </p>
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<h3>Where can I find an Apple II emulator?</h3>
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<p>Check out
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<a href="https://github.com/AppleWin/AppleWin/releases">AppleWin</a>,
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<a href="http://kegs.sourceforge.net/">KEGS</a>, and
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<a href="http://www.sheppyware.net/software-mac/sweet16/">Sweet16</a>.
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<h3>Why is my disk image opening in read-only mode?</h3>
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<p>Possible reasons:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>The file is marked "read only" in Windows. This is common
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for disk images copied off of CD-ROMs. Find the file in Windows
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Explorer, right click on it, select Properties, and make sure the "Read
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only" box is unchecked.</li>
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<li>When you open the disk image, make sure the "read only" checkbox
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in the file open dialog isn't checked.</li>
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<li>Disk images with damaged filesystems are opened read-only to avoid
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compounding existing problems. Open the file and hit Ctrl-I to bring
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up the Archive Info screen. If it says "damaged: yes", check
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the Notes section for an explanation.</li>
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<li>If you're opening a physical disk with "Open Volume" or the
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Volume Copier, un-check the "read only" checkbox. Read-only
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mode is enabled by default for physical disks, but you can change this from
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the "Disk Images" tab of the "Preferences" interface.</li>
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<li>When you open an archive that's inside another archive, it's expanded
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to a temporary file. Since any changes made to that file would be lost
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when you close it, the file is opened read-only.</li>
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</ul>
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<h3>When I paste files, the disk fills up almost immediately!</h3>
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<p>When pasting files into a ProDOS disk image, you can choose the directory
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into which the files should go. If the disk image doesn't have any
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subdirectories, all of the files will be pasted into the volume directory, which
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only holds 51 files. You need to paste the files into a subdirectory
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("folder"), which can hold an effectively unlimited number of files.</p>
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<p>If you were copying from a set of nested subdirectories, and you want to preserve the
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original structure, disable the "Strip pathnames when pasting
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files" option in Edit->Preferences (or paste with Edit->Paste Special
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and select "keep full pathnames"). If you were copying from a
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single subdirectory, or you want all of the files to be pasted into one place,
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you will need to create a subdirectory with Actions->Create Subdirectory
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first, and then paste into that.</p>
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<p>You can see how much free space a disk has with the File->Archive Info
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feature (just hit Ctrl-I after opening the disk image).</p>
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<h3>Why isn't my disk image recognized?</h3>
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<p>CiderPress tries to correctly identify the sector ordering and filesystem of
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every disk image, but in some cases it's not possible. The most common
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reason is that the disk image isn't in a recognized format (DOS, ProDOS, Pascal,
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CP/M, or RDOS). Many games were shipped with custom disk layouts, usually for
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copy protection reasons.</p>
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<p>In some cases, disks with modified versions of standard file systems will fail to be
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recognized. This is most common with "customized" DOS 3.3 disks
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that have abbreviated catalog tracks.</p>
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<p>Disk images that can't be opened with "Open..." can usually be
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opened with the Disk Viewer in the Tools menu. If the Disk
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Viewer can't open the image, then either it's stored in a file format CiderPress doesn't
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support, or it's not a disk image at all.</p>
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<h3>How do I open a modified or slightly damaged DOS 3.3 disk?</h3>
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<p>The disk format auto-detection algorithms rely on finding the disk catalog
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track. If it's very short, or partially damaged, CiderPress won't
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recognize the disk. In some circumstances you can specify the format
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manually:</p>
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<ul>
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<li>In Edit->Preferences->Disk Images, select "Confirm disk image
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format".</li>
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<li>Open the disk image with File->Open.</li>
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<li>When the disk image format dialog appears, select "DOS sector
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ordering" and "DOS 3.3". (If that doesn't work, try
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"ProDOS sector ordering".)</li>
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</ul>
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<p>This can also be used to select which half of a hybrid DOS/ProDOS image to
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use.</p>
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<h3>Why does CiderPress say my files are "suspicious" or
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"damaged"?</h3>
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<p>CiderPress runs an extensive set of consistency checks on disk images before
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it will allow them to be modified. Problems found might indicate damaged
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files, or might only indicate the potential for damage.</p>
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<p>For example, if some of the sectors of a file are not marked as "in
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use", the next file you copy to the disk could overwrite parts of the
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existing file, corrupting it. CiderPress prevents you from making
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damage worse by treating such disks as "read only".</p>
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<p>Some DOS 3.3 software shipped with "title" files in the
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catalog. These were only meant to highlight portions of the catalog, not
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hold data, so sometimes the software authors would use one sector in the catalog
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track as the "storage" for all of the titles. CiderPress will
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detect multiple files sharing the same storage, and mark them as
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"suspicious", meaning that their data might be present but that
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altering the files could have unforeseen consequences.
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"Suspicious" disks are also marked "read only".</p>
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<h3>Why are my .hdv images opening read-only?</h3>
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<p>Some ".hdv" files are undersized, and grow as you add files to
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them. CiderPress thinks these are damaged, because the size that the
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volume claims to be is much larger than the actual number of blocks in the
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file. You can tell what the difference is by opening the volume and
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selecting File->Archive Info (or hit Ctrl-I).</p>
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<p>To be able to write to these disks with CiderPress, you need to expand them
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to their full size. One approach is to force your emulator to expand
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them. To do this, launch a ProDOS block editor within the emulator, and
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open the last block on the disk (e.g. 65534 on a 32MB image). Read the
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block and write it back.</p>
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<p>Another approach is to create a new volume and copy all of the files
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over. To do this:</p>
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<ol>
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<li>Create a new disk image with File->New Disk Image. Select ProDOS
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and 32MB.</li>
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<li>Open the old disk image. Select all files with Edit->Select All
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(or hit Ctrl-A).</li>
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<li>Open the new disk image. Select Edit->Paste Special, and choose
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"Keep full pathnames". (If you don't have "strip
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pathnames when pasting files" set in Edit->Preferences, you can just
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use Edit->Paste, or hit Ctrl-V.)</li>
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</ol>
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<p>That's it. For some emulators it will be necessary to close the file in
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CiderPress (File->Close or Ctrl-W) and then rename it from ".po" to ".hdv".</p>
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<h3>How do I use DiskCopy 4.2 images on a Macintosh?</h3>
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<p>[this answer is probably out of date]</p>
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<p>Some (all?) DiskCopy utility programs on the Macintosh require the correct
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file type and creator type values to be set on disk image files. If you
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try to open a ".dsk" file with a generic file type, you'll get an
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error message claiming that the file format isn't recognized. The correct values
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are 'dImg' for the file type and 'dCpy' for the creator.</p>
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<p>You can use ResEdit, BBEdit, or Norton Utilities to change the type and
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creator. If you're using PC Exchange on the Macintosh to copy the images
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off of Windows-formatted disks, you can configure it to set the type
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automatically for ".dsk" files. </p>
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<h3>How do I format a floppy disk with ProDOS?</h3>
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<p>Copy a 720KB or 1.4MB ProDOS disk image to a PC-formatted floppy disk with
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"Volume Copier" in the Tools menu. If you don't have a disk
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image handy, create one with File->New->Disk Image.</p>
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<p>CiderPress does not perform low-level disk formatting, e.g. reformatting an
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800K disk for 720K. From Windows, open My Computer, right-click on the
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floppy drive, and select "Format".</p>
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<h3>Can I use CiderPress on a non-Windows system?</h3>
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<p>Yes, with emulation. It works reasonably well with Wine
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(<a href="http://winehq.org/">http://winehq.org/</a>),
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and very well with system emulators like the free
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<a href="https://www.virtualbox.org/">VirtualBox</a>.</p>
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<h3>Is there anything that CiderPress *doesn't* do?!</h3>
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<p>Yes. Take a look at our <a href="requested-features.htm">feature request list</a>.</p>
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</body>
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</html>
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