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Re: floppies & executor/Linux



Hi Folks,

Until we got 1.99p out, I was in crisis mode.  I let some of my e-mail
slip and am now trying to get totally caught up again before cranking
out the remaining new code for 2.0.

Now that Melissa is working for us, "questions@ardi.com" should be
answered promptly, but my e-mail will continue to back up
periodically.

--Cliff
ctm@ardi.com

>>>>> "Jeff" == Jeffrey A Halverson <halv0019@gold.tc.umn.edu> writes:

    Jeff> ARDI, As a side note...  Would it be possible to make the
    Jeff> floppy access a little smarter when it comes to
    Jeff> mounting/unmounting disks and for formating?  Either this
    Jeff> was broken a while back, or I couldn't get things to work
    Jeff> right.  It would have been helpful if you put in a
    Jeff> non-macintosh disk and hit "probe for floppy", that you get
    Jeff> a dialog box that says "NON-MACINTOSH disk!" or something.
    Jeff> (It would really be a plus if it then asks "format disk?"
    Jeff> and has options for different format types!)  Additionally,
    Jeff> I seem to remember that using "format floppy" was a bit
    Jeff> odd--perhaps I had a bad sector on my disk, or perhaps it
    Jeff> was broken under the version I tried it on...  But could a
    Jeff> format be verified some way?  Again, a nice dialog box would
    Jeff> be great!

The format code was broken for a while, and even now (and in 2.0)
Executor won't do a low-level format.  It will only write a blank
Macintosh filesystem on top of an already formatted floppy.

Your suggestions are good ones, but we have frozen 2.0's features and
are now scrambling to get everything put together and out the door.
We will be making the source to the Browser available when 2.0 is
released, so prorammers who really want to spruce it up will be able
to.

    Jeff> I know ARDI has been trying to avoid the "look&feel"
    Jeff> lawsuits that Apple seems to like so much, but I really to
    Jeff> want a better way to delete files, and a more direct way to
    Jeff> see a mounted floppy.  Could the top title bar possible make
    Jeff> a cute little ICON of a floppy disk whenever there is one
    Jeff> mounted?  (As opposed to the "hot band" idea, where if you
    Jeff> are in the "programs" part, you can't see the "drives"
    Jeff> part...)

Another good idea, but we just can't get to it before 2.0 is out.

    Jeff> Could we possible hear an update on what ARDI is thinking
    Jeff> for 2.0 GUI improvements?  What happened to the hiring of a
    Jeff> graphic artist to make icons, etc...?  I'd like to be able
    Jeff> to give you all feedback on these items since I think its
    Jeff> really important to ARDI's success!!!

We ran out of money.  On the other hand, we've had a couple (maybe
three) people send us icons to use in the Browser and we now have to
find them and examine them and incorporate them, so our Browser will
be slightly less ugly by the time 2.0 ships.

    Jeff> Later, Jeff Halverson

--Cliff
ctm@ardi.com


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