Managing Image files - Review requested
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It would be great if @Wengier and @joncampbell123 could take a gander.
https://github.com/Wengier/dosbox-x-wiki/wiki/Guide%3AManaging-image-files-in-DOSBox%E2%80%90X
In particular the outstanding issues:
https://github.com/Wengier/dosbox-x-wiki/wiki/Guide%3AManaging-image-files-in-DOSBox%E2%80%90X#outstanding-issues
- For
IMGMAKE, what in the IBM PC world uses 10-sector diskettes?? - It seems from the sourcecode that
IMGMAKEcan create VHD images if you use the .vhd extension, but this does not work in practice? - imgmount of QCOW2 images only works in combination with
-nofs, which is rather restrictive. Can this be easily solved? - How about IDE teriary through octenary controllers in dosbox-x config. Do the device ID and/or -ide options continue counting up to ID 18 and
-ide 8s? - Accessing image files from MacOS? I have no MacOS system and no experience with them.
- PC-98 descriptions need checking as I have no experience with them.
I recall once in 2004 finding a bunch of old 5.25" floppies, and some of them had a 10 sector per track formatting (400KB) used by some computer system called the "Rainbow 100".
Why would MS-DOS want to access the Mac OS filesystem? From past experience accessing Macintosh formatted floppies at all involved 3rd party software that just used INT 13h directly from within DOS/Windows and only if the Mac OS system used the 1.44MB MFM compatible format. PC floppy drives cannot read Apple's 800KB GCR encoding. Mac OS uses the HFS filesystem which is very different from what DOS supports.
PC-98 could be easily supported, the big difference is that their partition table is completely different from the MBR structure used by IBM PC/XT/AT systems and completely dependent on disk geometry to make any sense of it (no LBA-style sector numbers). Other than that the DOS filesystem contained within is the same.
@joncampbell123 And those 10-sector disks could be read by a PC?
I found the Rainbow 100 here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainbow_100 and it indeed mentions 10 sector disks using FAT12, and having an MS-DOS mode using the Intel 8088.
What I meant with "Accessing image files from MacOS", is to open currently-supported disk images in the host OS without using DOSBox-X. On the wiki page you can see I added that for Linux and Windows, to make it easier for users to transfer files into and out-of image files.
As to the PC-98, it is about documentation. Is the little that I say in the wiki about PC-98 correct?
I think indeed more information about PC-98 can be written in the Wiki, perhaps also a separate Wiki page for an introduction to the PC-98 feature in DOSBox-X. But in order to actually write such a page, I need to experience more about it too.
@rderooy I noticed that you did not mention the ability to mount image files via the Drive menu in that article. This is likely more convenient than using the command-line, even though it is only available for Windows. You can probably add this information to the page too.
@Wengier I'm in the same boat as you regarding the PC-98. I know little about it.
Regarding the drive menu, your right. I almost don't mention it. Probably because it is unfortunately Windows only, so I don't use it myself :-)
@Wengier I did some further updates to the wiki pages.
The DOS 2.0-3.21 installation steps are simplified now that there is support for mounting older harddisk partitions without specifying geometry.
And I mention the Drive menu in more detail on the image guide page.
@rderooy In my latest pull request I have added a new item "Boot from disk image" in the drive menu (A, C, D drives only) to boot the specified image file directly for that drive. One step for both mounting and booting, bypassing any previously mounted image (if any). It is only for Windows though just like the other mounting options.
@joncampbell123 My goal is always to improve DOSBox-X as a whole, which means that I don't really care about individual changes as a general rule. For very few things that may significantly improve DOSBox-X I do have somewhat stronger preferences for them, such as in the case of Windows installer which I believed can greatly improve its usability, but once I conclude you indeed have concern with them (as it has gradually become apparent in the case of Windows installer, although you never explicitly mentioned this), I will follow you no matter what. For other features that may not greatly improve DOSBox-X I don't even bother to have suggested to you anyway.
@joncampbell123 I have been promoting DOSBox-X to other users in other forums recently too, instead of promoting similar projects including my own. I decided to help improve DOSBox-X following your direction after all.
@joncampbell123 I will follow your specific comments too of course. For example, if you indeed dislike the Windows installer and want it removed from the repository (it was there for 4 years already, although not officially used), I am fine with doing that too.
@Wengier I don't bother to use the Windows installer scripts at this time but I'm happy to keep it in the codebase as long as it works for you.
@joncampbell123 I see. And thanks for your comment. I will never suggest to you for this in the future any more (you will fully decide if or when to use it for official releases). I have a question though: since I want to promote DOSBox-X in other forums and want to make it easier for those users, can I make Windows installers for DOSBox-X from the code by myself for them to download and use? This does not mean they are officially-released Windows-installer versions by you of course.
@Wengier I'm perfectly fine with that. I trust you're not going to bundle malware or anything into it.
@joncampbell123 Of course I will not bundle anything else except for DOSBox-X itself (I will generally just use the unmodified Windows installer code from the repository for this purpose). Thank you for this!
@joncampbell123 For your information, I have already made the Windows installer for the official DOSBox-X 0.83.3 builds myself and saved it to this repository as the permanent link. It is code-signed by Edward Mendelson to bypass the Windows SmartScreen filter.
https://github.com/Wengier/dosbox-x-wiki/raw/master/DOSBox-X-0.83.3-setup.exe
@joncampbell123 If you are interested, you can see the discussions for the post I made for the DOSBox-X 0.83.3 release (with Windows installer) in Reddit here:
https://www.reddit.com/r/emulation/comments/hl8txx/dosboxx_0833_released_with_allinone_windows/