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Minor improvement in documentation by reordering Sections discussing CLRDIR

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Mark Pruden
2025-08-31 12:37:30 +10:00
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@@ -1117,100 +1117,6 @@ starting the operating system. Even better, you can use an auto-submit
batch file to customzie the assignments at startup without any user
intervention.
## Disk Operations/Commands
With some understanding of how RomWBW presents disk space to the
operating systems, we need to go over the options for actually setting
up your disk(s) with content.
### Preparing Media for First Use
You can initialize the media in-place using your RomWBW system.
Essentially, this means you are creating a set of blank directories on
your disk so that files can be saved there.
This is somewhat analogous to partitioning of a hard disk
or doing a low level format of a floppy disk.
Initilizing a Floppy disk is covered in the section [Floppy Disk Formatting],
or for a Hard disk the section [Hard Disk Preparation] covers the steps to
manually setup a hard disk for first use.
### Clearing (Formatting) Drives
This is somewhat analogous to doing a FORMAT operation on other systems.
With RomWBW you use the `CLRDIR` command to do this.
This command is merely "clearing out" the directory space of the drive
referred to by a drive letter and setting up the new empty directory.
Refer to $doc_apps$ for more information on use of the `CLRDIR` command.
Since `CLRDIR` works on drive letters, make
absolutely sure you know what media and slice are assigned to that
drive letter before using `CLRDIR` because `CLRDIR` will wipe out any
pre-existing contents of the slice.
After `CLRDIR` completes, the slice should be ready to use by the operating
system via the drive letter assigned.
Start by using the `DIR` command on the drive.
This should return without error, but list no files.
Here is an example of using `CLRDIR`. In this example, the `ASSIGN`
command is used to show the current drive letter assignments. Then
the `CLRDIR` command is used to initialize the directory of drive 'G'
which is slice 2 of hard disk device IDE0 ("IDE0:2").
```
B>ASSIGN
A:=MD0:0
B:=MD1:0
C:=FD0:0
D:=FD1:0
E:=IDE0:0
F:=IDE0:1
G:=IDE0:2
H:=IDE0:3
B>CLDIR G:
CLRDIR Version 1.2B May 2024 by Max Scane
Warning - this utility will overwrite the directory sectors of Drive: G
Type CAPITAL Y to proceed, any key other key to exit. Y
Directory cleared.
B>
```
### Checking Disk Layout
If you are not sure which disk layout is used for your existing
media, you can use the CP/M 2.2 `STAT` command to display information
including the number of "32 Byte Directory Entries"
for a drive letter on the corresponding hard disk.
- If it indicates 512, your disk layout is Classic (hd512).
- If it indicates 1024, your disk layout is Modern (hd1k).
Here is an example of checking the disk layout.
```
B>STAT E:DSK:
E: Drive Characteristics
65408: 128 Byte Record Capacity
8176: Kilobyte Drive Capacity
1024: 32 Byte Directory Entries
0: Checked Directory Entries
256: Records/ Extent
32: Records/ Block
64: Sectors/ Track
2: Reserved Tracks
```
It is critical that you include `DSK:` after the drive letter in the
`STAT` command line. The important line to look at is labeled "32 Byte
Directory Entries".
# Disk Types
## RAM & ROM Disks
@@ -1500,7 +1406,9 @@ There are two approaches to preparing disks for use by RomWBW.
including files to a disk.
This section of the document describes the manual process of preparing
empty disks that are ready for use by an operating system.
empty disks that are ready for use by an operating system.
This is somewhat analogous to partitioning and formatting of a hard disk
or doing a low level format of a floppy disk.
Alternatively, you can use the pre-built RomWBW disk images to quickly
create disk media that already has a large selection of files and
@@ -1728,12 +1636,7 @@ You need to initialize each slice for CP/M to use it.
This is somewhat analogous to doing a FORMAT operation on other systems,
and is done using the `CLRDIR` command.
This is covered in the section [Clearing (Formatting) Drives]
**WARNING**: Earlier versions of the `CLRDIR` application do not
appear to check for disk errors when it runs. If you attempt to run
`CLRDIR` on a drive that is mapped to a slice that does not actually fit
on the physical disk, it may behave erratically.
This is covered in the next section [Clearing (Formatting) Drives]
Assuming you want to use additional slices, you should initialize them
using the same process. You may need to reassign drive letters to
@@ -1742,11 +1645,57 @@ You can use the `ASSIGN` command to handle this.
## Post Disk Preparation
Once a disk (either floppy or hard disk) has been initialised and
formattted you may optionally;
Once a disk has been initialised you may need to do one or more of the following;
* Clear (Format) the drive
* Make the disk bootable
* Copy system (or other) files to the disk
### Clearing (Formatting) Drives
This is somewhat analogous to doing a FORMAT operation on other systems.
With RomWBW you use the `CLRDIR` command to do this.
This command is merely "clearing out" the directory space of the drive
referred to by a drive letter and setting up the new empty directory.
Refer to $doc_apps$ for more information on use of the `CLRDIR` command.
Since `CLRDIR` works on drive letters, make
absolutely sure you know what media and slice are assigned to that
drive letter before using `CLRDIR` because `CLRDIR` will wipe out any
pre-existing contents of the slice.
After `CLRDIR` completes, the drive should be ready to use by the operating
system via the drive letter assigned.
Start by using the `DIR` command on the drive.
This should return without error, but list no files.
Here is an example of using `CLRDIR`. In this example, the `ASSIGN`
command is used to show the current drive letter assignments. Then
the `CLRDIR` command is used to initialize the directory of drive 'G'
which is slice 2 of hard disk device IDE0 ("IDE0:2").
```
B>ASSIGN
A:=MD0:0
B:=MD1:0
C:=FD0:0
D:=FD1:0
E:=IDE0:0
F:=IDE0:1
G:=IDE0:2
H:=IDE0:3
B>CLDIR G:
CLRDIR Version 1.2B May 2024 by Max Scane
Warning - this utility will overwrite the directory sectors of Drive: G
Type CAPITAL Y to proceed, any key other key to exit. Y
Directory cleared.
B>
```
### Making a Disk Bootable
To make a disk bootable you will need to follow the specific instructions
@@ -1777,6 +1726,38 @@ system and application files to your disks.
Refer to [Transferring Files] for more information on getting
files onto your disks.
### Checking Disk Layout
If you are not sure which disk layout is used for your existing
media, you can use the CP/M 2.2 `STAT` command to display information
including the number of "32 Byte Directory Entries"
for a drive letter on the corresponding hard disk.
Note: For CP/M 3 the command is `SHOW [DRIVE]`
- If it indicates 512, your disk layout is Classic (hd512).
- If it indicates 1024, your disk layout is Modern (hd1k).
Here is an example of checking the disk layout.
```
B>STAT E:DSK:
E: Drive Characteristics
65408: 128 Byte Record Capacity
8176: Kilobyte Drive Capacity
1024: 32 Byte Directory Entries
0: Checked Directory Entries
256: Records/ Extent
32: Records/ Block
64: Sectors/ Track
2: Reserved Tracks
```
It is critical that you include `DSK:` after the drive letter in the
`STAT` command line. The important line to look at is labeled "32 Byte
Directory Entries".
# Disk Images
Since it would be quite a bit of work to transfer over all the files you