Groups | Search | Server Info | Keyboard shortcuts | Login | Register [http] [https] [nntp] [nntps]

Groups > comp.sys.apple2.programmer > #1183

Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments

Show all headers | View raw

Dear All:)

I am in the begiining of the process of writing an archiver that will run in 
Windows, Unix-like systems, and anywhere that Ansi C can be used, and a 
second archiver which run on the Apple II as an Aztec C65 SYS program. These 
programs will be called HUF2 and will create archives called "HUF Balls" 
with the extension of .HUF. The Win32 gcc MinGW executable version will be 
called Huf2.exe and the MS-DOS version will be called Huf216.exe, and the 
MicroSoft C Win32 version will be Huf232.exe. I don't care what the other 
versions will be called... likely Huf2 would be best though. The Aztec C65 
Prodos version willl be called Huf2.SYS and the DOS 3.3 version will be 
Huf2.BIN. The Aztec C65 Shell version for ProDOS will be called Huf2. If I 
produce an Aztec C65 DOS 3.3 shell version it will also be called Huf2.

Distribution will be on disk images for the Apple II, and the whole works 
including docs and source code will be distributed in a ZIP file (not a HUF2 
file) and distributed from the Apple Oldies Website.

Here is the idea. Years ago I took one of Yoshi's many sample archivers 
which used Adaptive Huffman encoding and created yet another MS-DOS archiver 
Called "ARBUCKLE".
Compression was pretty good, but I did not provide support for 
subirectories. I kept it simple. The file extension was ARB. I never 
distributed this program because I did not think that the world needed yet 
another archiver. I wrote it for my own enjoyment. I even provided a 
self-extracting archive scheme.

For the Apple II version of my new archiver, I want to keep it simple. I 
want to be able to use auxiliary memory on the Apple II as working space. 
And I want to be able to append (add) or update files in an existing 
archive, and to delete files from an existing archive.

I want this available in 2 versions:

1. DOS 3.3 FileTypes
2. PRODOS FileTypes

I want to use CiderPress File Attribute Preservation tags to store the files 
and provide auto-translation between filetypes in ProDOS or DOS 3.3 
including name length translation.

Anyone who has ever written an archiver of non-trivial nature will 
immediately understand that on today's computers, memory, disk space, and 
processing speed are not an issue. Anyone that understands the Apple II also 
understands that all 3 of memory, disk space, and processing speed are in 
fact issues.

Some assembly language will be required to get the kind of performance out 
of Aztec C65 that I need to make this work.

The Ansi Version of this archiver has no such contraints, but will require 
file attribute preservation tags to be used for specific file type names 
when archiving from the host system, be it Windows, or the Mac, or Linux, 
etc.

I will also use CiderPress logic when file attribute preservation tags are 
not used; they will be stored as a ProDOS NON Type with applicable 
translation when dearchiving on the Apple II.

In this case my many Apple II Utilities which change FileTypes in ProDOS and 
DOS 3.3 can be used, as well as text translation utilities which I have 
written of late.

Nothing will persuade me to support directories.

I think that about covers what I am going to do, except to say that I 
envision this utility being used for 2 specific purposes by some:

1. To pack files together in a HUF Ball to save Apple II disk space and 
increase transfer speed for upload or downloads between Apple II and other 
computers.

2. For other purposes that I haven't thought of.

Some others will ignore it, or learn from it, or crticize it.

So for the first part of my design phase, which is being inspired by an 
email from Rob, I will leave this open for comments. As always I will 
follow-through with the program, so this is not something that I am wishing 
for. I just want to hear what the guys have to say about it.

I'll lay-out exactly everything in the documentation the way I usually do 
and the code will be fully commented and then some.

I also wrote an image converter for MS-DOS back in those days that provided 
compression aproximately equal to GIF. So if you are looking for some point 
of reference for compression ratio, that's about it.

In my opinion the ZIP format isn't well suited to my project nor LZW. So 
I'll leave that Troll remark out there to see what get's said about that 
too.

I do want to thank Rob for the idea. I also want to scold Rob for the idea; 
I swore almost 30 years ago that I would do nothing further with archivers 
when I wrote ARBUCKLE. I also swore I would do nothing about the image 
format that I developed around Adaptive Huffman. But it just so happens that 
his suggestion seems to have trumped my resolution, which is hardly 
surprising considering that my new agenda is retro-development which 30 
years ago I never imagined. It is better than beer, and better for my health 
as well, so I may as well thank Rob twice.

Besides, he is a fellow countryman, and deserves a reward for surviving in 
the same snowbelt that I live in. We're tougher than a bunch of southerners, 
and better looking too.

All the Best,

Bill

Back to comp.sys.apple2.programmer | Previous | Next — Next in thread | Find similar | Unroll thread

Thread

Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments "Bill Buckels" <bbuckels@mts.net> - 2014-03-06 14:54 -0600
  Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments Antoine Vignau <antoine.vignau@laposte.net> - 2014-03-06 23:30 -0800
    Re: Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments "Bill Buckels" <bbuckels@mts.net> - 2014-03-07 07:20 -0600
      Re: Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments gids.rs@sasktel.net - 2014-03-07 09:35 -0800
        Re: Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments "Bill Buckels" <bbuckels@mts.net> - 2014-03-07 17:31 -0600
          Re: Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments gids.rs@sasktel.net - 2014-03-07 16:58 -0800
  Re: Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments Jurai <Jurai@WhereTheHellAmI.???> - 2014-03-08 09:10 -0700
    Re: Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments "Bill Buckels" <bbuckels@mts.net> - 2014-03-08 20:32 -0600
      Re: Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments Dagen Brock <DagenBrock@gmail.com> - 2014-03-22 22:27 -0700
        Re: Archiver Project for the 8 Bit Apple II - Request for Comments "Bill Buckels" <bbuckels@mts.net> - 2014-03-23 04:28 -0500

csiph-web