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DISKED The DISK EDitor For IBM-PC/XT/AT Computers Software and Manual Designed and Written by Gregg Jennings Software Version 2.4 Documentation Version 2.1 December 2, 1993 (c) 1989-1993 by Gregg Jennings ALL WRONGS RESERVED DISKED page 2 WHAT DISKED IS DISKED is a simple to use disk editor and data recovery program for IBM-PC/XT/AT and compatible computers. It allows the editing of any sector and the saving of sectors to a file. DISKED provides a way to recover data from disks with a damaged BOOT sector, damaged FATs, and damaged directory areas, allowing the saving of otherwise lost data. DISKED is meant to be very easy to learn and to use -- it is operated by entering easy to remember single letter commands. Its simple interface enables the user to have full control over the program, letting it be run with full confidence and assurance. DISKED was and still is being developed with ease of use as the number one feature. WHAT DISKED IS NOT Although DISKED can recover an erased file's data, DISKED cannot unerase a file. DISKED also does not format nor change any parameters of the format of a disk -- does not fix bad sectors -- does no file copying, moving or deleting -- there are better utilities for that. All DISKED does is read, write, and store any available sector of a disk in a simple and easy, yet powerful and versatile way. ┌──────────────────────────────────┐ │ BUT REMEMBER │ │DISKED CAN RECOVER DATA FROM DISKS│ │ WHEN DOS UTILITIES CANNOT │ └──────────────────────────────────┘ REQUIREMENTS This version of DISKED requires an IBM compatible with 128KB of memory and DOS version 3.0 or higher. DISKED supports all IBM PC/XT/AT drive formats. DISKED page 3 TUTORIAL DISKED comes up at the disk's root directory sector and is in a combined command and edit mode. DISKED displays each sector as you move about the disk. Movement is done by the direction keys similar to paging through a text document -- you always know exactly where you are on the disk. There are two available areas for data; a sector buffer that holds selected sector's data and a file buffer that allows saving sector data for writing to a disk file. The sector buffer can be changed in a manner similar to a debugger and can be written back to the disk. There is also a spare sector buffer to which a sector can be stored and retrieved for copying to another sector. Data is saved by appending single or multiple sectors into the file buffer. The file buffer can then be observed and changed, written to a disk file, emptied, or more sectors appended or unappended. Any number of absolute sectors can also be written to a file. These features produce a very versatile program. DISKED page 4 Section 1 Using DISKED 1.1 Documentation Notes This document assumes that the user knows certain computer terms. Specific terms are: hexadecimal numbers; strings and bytes; tracks, sectors and clusters; control characters and ASCII. In this documentation, the word disk is used to mean either the hard disk drive or a floppy diskette -- the media that holds the data; the word drive use used as meaning the DOS drive as in 'A:' or 'C:', as well as any logical drives or ram drives when device drivers are used. The word sector is used in two different and distinct ways -- there are physical and logical sectors of a disk. The physical sector references pertain to the disk drive hardware, the logical sectors pertain to DOS. Physical sectors come in to play, as far as DISKED is concerned, with the 's' (select physical position) command and parameter display only. All other references to sectors are logical, which run from 0 to the end of the disk. 1.1.1 Command Input Conventions The commands, arguments, and keys designated in this manual use the following conventions: Convention Description D A valid drive letter. n A decimal or hexadecimal number. x A hexadecimal number. s An ASCII string. c An ASCII character. C A letter. ^C A control character. 'c' A DISKED command key. 's' A DISKED keyword. | More than one key will perform the same command. DISKED page 5 end A cursor key. F1 Function key. TAB Other special key. 1.1.2 Keyboard Input Because some commands are instantaneous any command typed that needs an argument cannot be erased (i.e. a backspace or delete will not erase it), yet a return or an escape will usually cancel. Commands that do not require an argument will be performed without a return. When a command argument is needed, during input, the backspace will delete characters, a ^C or ESC will cancel the command, a ^U will delete all input. A return, a space, or a comma ends the input. A return will be automatically entered if the maximum number of characters is input. When a number argument needs to be input, only numbers will be accepted. Any number required will be of 1 to 5 places so, depending on the type of argument required, too large of a number cannot be entered. Any argument that is out of bounds will just be ignored. When more than one number needs to be input, a return, a space, or a comma can be used to separate the numbers. Whenever DISKED asks for confirmation of a command, a capital or lowercase Y will confirm and any other key will cancel. DISKED page 6 Section 2 Commands Note: any command that deals with files that exist on the disk will be disabled if file indexing is off (cf. 3.1.0). 2.1 Drives Command Function lD Log in drive D as the disk to use. The file buffer is left alone, allowing for data recovery to the same drive. The first sector of the root directory area is selected after the log in (cf. 3.1.0). ^L Re-log current drive. This should be done whenever the file buffer is written to the current disk and filename display is on (cf. 3.1.0). When a floppy disk has been changed it does not have to be logged in unless the new disk is of a different format or filename displaying is wanted. 2.2 Moving When moving, the disk is treated as circular. Movement past either end results in "wrapping" around to the other end. Each sector contents is displayed after every movement. The sector data can be displayed in a variety of formats; 16 bytes per line hex/ASCII (only the first 128 bytes are displayed, this is the default), 24 bytes per line hex/ASCII (the full sector contents), ASCII only, and a directory format. The format is selectable (cf. 3.1.0). Command Function sn,n,n Select the track, sector, and head respectfully, separated by commas or spaces. A return will end the input. Any parameter may be omitted leaving it unchanged. sb Select the BOOT sector. sf Select the beginning of the first FAT area. Sn Select the first sector of cluster n. ^Sn Select the logical sector n. end Select last sector. DISKED page 7 home Select the beginning of the root directory. n Next sector. ^N|pgdn Next track. N|right Next cluster. b Back sector. ^B|pgup Back track. B|left Back cluster. +n Increment n sectors. -n Decrement n sectors. r Range forward by sectors. If the key hit is a number the pause between sectors is increased or decreased, 1 being the fastest, 9 the slowest. A space will pause, any other key will cancel. ^R Range backward. R Range by clusters. 1-9 Select the tagged sector. See the 't' command. j|^right Jump to the next cluster of the file that the current cluster is allocated to. J|^left Jump to the previous cluster of the file that the current cluster is allocated to. ^home Start cluster of file that the current cluster is allocated to. ^end End cluster of the file that the current cluster is allocated to. Shft-right Next free cluster. Shft-left Back free cluster. 2.3 Editing Command Function DISKED page 8 cn Change sector contents starting at buffer location n. The address of the sector offset is shown along with the data in hex and ASCII. A return or a space leaves the data alone and advances to the next, a backspace advances to the previous, always wrapping around at the extremes of the buffer. The the buffer position can be changed and new data can be entered by typing a new value in a variety of ways. Table 2.1: Change Formats x hex number 'c ASCII character ^C control character "s string CR/SP next location TAB go to location 00 =x go to location x \x go to number x \'c go to character c \^C go to control character C -x1,x2 fill x1 places of x2 +x1,x2 replace all x1 with x2 ?|/ display command summary .|ESC exit change Changes are not written to the disk. See the 'w' command. C Change file buffer contents. ^C Change the sector buffer in a directory format. The file names, file attributes, and file times and dates can be changed. The file attributes are toggled by the spacebar; the volume label or deleted files can not be changed. The DOS system files must not be changed. There is no out- of-bounds checking for the times and dates. If the sector is not a directory sector the change fields will still be in the directory format. Table 2.2: Directory Change CR/SP next entry TAB next field SHFT-TAB previous field =n go to entry n ?|/ display command summary .|ESC exit change Changes are not written to the disk. See the 'w' command. DISKED page 9 k Kill any changes to the sector buffer. After any changes have been made to the sector buffer, a 'k' will restore it to its original state. The sector is not written to the disk. The file buffer cannot be unchanged. w Write the sector buffer back to the disk, presumably after changes have been made, or after a saved sector has been retrieved by the '<' command. A 'w' in the BOOT or FAT area will cause a warning message to be displayed only and will always ask for confirmation. Care should be used when in the BOOT sector, any FAT sector, or any directory area. This command has to be enabled by an entry in the DISKED.INI file (cf. 3.2.1) and turned on from within DISKED (cf. 3.1.0). 2.4 Copying The copy commands copy disk data into the file buffer. All commands indicate when the file buffer is full. The size of the file buffer is displayed by the BS command, the amount of the file buffer contents is displayed at the prompt. Command Function a Append the current sector into the file buffer. A Append the current cluster. ^An1,n2 Append n2 bytes from offset n1 of the sector. u Unappend a sector size amount of bytes out of the file buffer. U Unappend a cluster size amount of bytes. ^Un Unappend n bytes. gn Get n sectors. Append the next n sectors, starting from the current sector, into the file buffer, leaving the current sector selected. Any key hit while cancel the getting. g0 Get the entire current track. g1 Get the rest of the track, starting from the current sector. DISKED page 10 ^Gn Get n sectors and move n+1 sectors. e Empty the file buffer. ^E Empty the file buffer regardless of the 'verify' keyword (cf. 3.1.0). 2.5 Storing Any one sector can be stored in a special buffer for retrieval at any time. This special buffer contents remains the same until another sector is stored. Command Function > Store sector. < Retrieve sector. If there is no sector stored nothing happens, if there is, the sector buffer is overwritten by the stored sector and displayed as by a normal sector move. The sector is not written to the disk. 2.6 Files During any file input or output, the buffer will be translated according to the 'mask', 'strip' and 'convert' keywords except when noted (cf. 0). During file reading or writing any key hit will cancel. Command Function ps Put the file buffer to file s. ^Ps Put the file buffer to file s without any character translations. All bytes will be written, including any EOF characters. Pn1,n2,s Put n2 sectors, starting at n1 (or the current sector if n2 is a left out) to file s without any translations. is Insert the file s into the file buffer (as much as possible). ^Is Insert the file s without any character translations. Is Insert the file that the current sector is allocated to. m Map out the clusters of the file that the current cluster is allocated to. DISKED page 11 2.7 Displaying Command Function / List command summary. ? Extra command summary. BS Display drive parameters. SPACE Display top 128 bytes of sector buffer. CR Display the next 384 bytes. ^J Display position. dn Display the file buffer a page (256 bytes) at a time starting from address n, in a hex/ASCII format. vn View the file buffer contents with translation according to the translation keywords. ^V View the sector buffer. The viewing will not pause until the end of the sector is reached. Shft-F1 Display top 128 bytes of sector buffer. Shft-F2 Display full sector buffer. Shft-F3 View the sector buffer. Shft-F4 Directory display the file buffer. 2.8 Searching Command Function fs Find string s; a null response will search for the previously entered string. Any key hit while in progress will stop the search. The following control characters can be embedded in the string: DISKED page 12 Table 2.3: Find Control Charcters \0 null \a bell \f form feed \n line feed \r return \s space \t tab \xxx hexadecimal value xx \\ backslash Extended characters (values greater than '~' or 7Eh) can be entered by Alt-Keypad sequences. ^Fs Find s on the disk searching backward. Fs Find s in the file buffer. 2.9 Exiting Command Function q|.|ESC Return to DOS. The drive and directory that was current when DISKED was loaded will be re-selected. ^Q Return to DOS regardless of the 'verify' keyword. 2.10 Miscellaneous Command Function zs Show and/or change keywords (cf 2). Z Show keywords only. , Toggle input radix between decimal and hexadecimal. All numbers displayed or input will be either decimal or hexadecimal. The default is decimal. F1 Display the name of and the files in the currently selected directory. This will be the directory for all default file I/O. F2 Display all files on the disk. A space will pause the displaying, an ESC will abort. F3 Display the number of files and directories on the disk. DISKED page 13 F4s Make the directory s the current directory for all default file I/O. F5 Re-read current sector. F6 Append sector with 'strip'; ignores the 'strip' keyword. F7 Append sector with 'convert'; ignores the 'convert' keyword. F8 Append sector with 'mask'; ignores the 'mask' keyword. F9 Append sector with translation as per the 'mask', 'strip' and 'convert' keywords.' F10s Set to the first cluster of the file or directory s. The full path name need not be given unless there are duplicate files on the disk. tn Tag the current sector. Assigns n (1-9) to the current sector, enabling the selection of that sector by typing the corresponding number. x View the DISKED.INI file. X View the DISKED.SAV file. ^X Save the current state of DISKED to a file named DISKED.SAV. The file will be written to the directory named in the INIT environment variable or to the default directory. The drive, sector, tagged sector list, and last search string will be saved. ^Z Restore DISKED state by reading the DISKED.SAV file. DISKED page 14 Section 3 DISKED Initialization 3.1 DISKED Keywords Keywords are the names of certain parameters indicating how some commands will function. Keyword Function ascii Displays sector data to the screen as the '^V' command, with translation according to the translation keywords. convert Converts all non-printable bytes to its hexadecimal equivalent between angle brackets during file I/O or when the file buffer is viewed to the screen. display Displays a description of and information about the command before it is performed. files All filenames on the disk will be read and indexed so that the filename can be matched to each cluster and displayed. get A move is made after sectors are appended using the 'g' command. home The first sector of the root directory area of a disk is selected after it is logged in. mask Masks off the high bit of all bytes during file I/O or when the file buffer is viewed to the screen. logical Displays disk information without references to the physical properties of the disk. partial Displays just the first 128 bytes of a sector when not in Ascii mode. Otherwise 512 bytes are displayed. strip Strips out (ignores) all non-printable bytes during file I/O or when the file buffer viewed to the screen. translate Displays directory sectors in a directory format. verify Asks for confirmation when performing any of the more powerful commands. write Enables the writing of sectors to the disk. DISKED page 15 These parameters can be turned on and off (or enabled and disabled) from within DISKED or by an initialization file. By default they are all on except for 'ascii', 'files' and 'write'. 3.2 Changing DISKED Parameters 3.2.1 Outside DISKED DISKED will look for a DISKED.INI file to set or change the DISKED keywords. In the DISKED.INI file enter the keyword followed by either 'on' or 'off'. DISKED will first search the directory indicated by the "INIT" DOS environment variable, then the directory in which DISKED was executed from, and finally the default directory. 3.2.2 Inside DISKED By the use of the 'z' command these parameters can be changed inside DISKED. The 'z' is followed by a string containing the first letter of the keyword to be changed, toggling it on or off. Only the keyword letters are valid, all other characters are ignored. When the 'display' parameter is on, all keywords and their values are shown before inputting. For added protection, the 'write' parameter must be in DISKED.INI and then turned on by the 'z' command for the 'w' command to work. A quicker way of changing the keywords is by using the Alt key and the first letter. The parameter is changed and its new value is displayed. DISKED page 16 Section 4 Hints on Usage 4.1 Bad Sectors 4.1.1 Damage Damage is when a sector can not be read due to physical defects on the disk. Damage will most likely be trapped by DOS with the standard message; if retrying does eventually result in the sector being read you are in luck. DISKED does not do anything fancy when reading 1 sectors -- it relies on DOS . Damage in the data area results in DISKED not being able to read those sectors and if they lie in a file then only the readable parts of the file can be recovered. Executable files cannot be recovered in this situation. Damage in the BOOT area can be circumvented by logging in a good disk of the same format then putting in the disk with the bad BOOT sector. DISKED can not log on to a hard drive if it has a damaged BOOT sector only if it is "known" by the operating system (if DOS does not issue the "Invalid drive specification" message). If damage is found in the FAT or in a directory area, DISKED will automatically turn off the 'files' keyword. DISKED makes no use the FAT bad cluster information. 4.1.2 Corruption Corrupt data is invalid information on the disk; this results just as if the areas were damaged if the corruption lies in the BOOT, FAT, or directory areas, for normal DOS utilities and applications. Corrupt data can be a foreign type of media (not really corrupt but unable to be interpreted), a disk that was inadvertently written to by power failures or system crashes, or, on single floppy systems (like laptops), a disk was changed at the wrong time causing another disk's data written on it. _______________________________________________________________________ 1. Central Point Software Inc. has an excellent product call the Deluxe Option Board that can literally copy, completely, physically damaged diskettes (cf. Appendix D) DISKED page 17 The BOOT sector can be fixed by reading the BOOT of a good disk of the same format, putting in the corrupted disk and writing the sector. The DOS FORMAT command will of course fix a disk, but all data will be lost (although one could press ^Break after the first track is formatted). The FAT can be written in a similar manner. Just remember to copy from a disk without files. An empty FAT has a sequence of 3 bytes indicating the type of format and is then all zeros. The number of sectors of the FATs is displayed in the drive statistics. An empty ROOT is filled with zeros. The number of sectors of the ROOT is the logical sector number of the first cluster minus the logical sector number of the 'home' position. DISKED page 18 4.2 Recovering Files 4.2.1 Text Files Getting back text files is basically a hit and miss situation. Knowing some of the text helps by searching for it. If not, ranging, or paging over the disk is the only way. Once a sector with data to be recovered is found, search back to the beginning of the data and then do a 'g1' to get the rest of the track. Display the file buffer to find out how many sectors should have been read in. By the correct number of 'u's, or an 'e' followed by a 'gn' with the correct number of sectors, a good chunk of data can be retrieved. If the data extends beyond a track, more data can be retrieved by a '^N' (or pgdn) followed by a 'g0'. If the data is very fragmented, range by the 'r' command, stopping and appending as needed. Since DOS stores file data by clusters, it may be more efficient to move a cluster at a time. If large amounts of data are to be recovered, always put the file buffer to another disk to avoid overwriting recoverable data. Understanding the beginning byte sequence of formatted files and worksheet and database files will give something to search for. A little investigation of files can provide this information. 4.2.2 Executable Files Executable files can only be recovered if the size is known and the file is contiguous. EXE format files provide the size information. COM files and overlays do not. In an EXE file, the fourth and fifth bytes of the file contains the file size in 512 byte pages. The number is in hexadecimal and stored least significant byte first. For example 17 00 shows that the file is 17 pages long not 1700. Since a sector is 512 bytes long this makes recovering the file by getting that many 2 sectors . Also, the first two bytes of all EXE files is 4d 5a (hex), which is MZ in ASCII. This enables the finding of the beginning of the EXE file. If the recovered EXE file results in the DOS message "ERROR in EXE file" (or if it hangs the system) then the file was not contiguous or was corrupted. _______________________________________________________________________ 2. More sectors than are needed may be saved and the program will run correctly. DISKED page 19 4.3 Other Uses Another well suited use for DISKED is the changing of messages that a program displays. If many copies of a program are being distributed, each copy having a unique serial number or message, DISKED can be used to go to that particular sector holding the information, change data and then to write the sector. This takes the place of multiple compilations or expensive serialization programs. This is further speeded up by making multiple floppies containing just that one program, and setting to the appropriate sector once, make the change, write the sector, put in the next disk, make the change, write the sector, and so on. DISKED is the only program that allows this kind of work to be done (at a reasonable price!). DISKED also lets you investigate and create small files containing codes outside ASCII values. DISKED also lets you edit a file without an editor. DISKED page 20 Section 5 An Example of Usage C:>disked a: Serial No: 1.NF3.011 DOS: 3.3 buffer size: 16384 number of drives: 4 current drive: A: media: IBM 3.3 volume label: ? current directory: \ drive size: 363520 cluster size: 1024 sector size: 512 total sectors: 719 sectors/fat: 2 sectors/cluster: 2 sectors: 1-9 tracks: 0-39 clusters: 0-355 heads: 0-1 '/' for help track 0, sector 6(5), head 0 00000: 44 45 4d 4f 20 20 20 20 45 58 45 20 00 00 00 00 DEMO EXE .... 00016: 00 00 00 00 00 00 74 8a c9 14 02 00 04 00 00 00 ......t......... . . . 00096: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ 00112: 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ (00000)*s track b track 0, sector 1(0), head 0 BOOT 00000: eb 34 90 49 42 4d 20 20 33 2e 33 00 02 02 01 00 .4.IBM 3.3...... 00016: 02 70 00 d0 02 fd 02 00 09 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 .p.............. . . . 00096: 1a 7c 88 16 2a 7c a3 39 7c c3 b4 02 8b 16 39 7c .|..*|.9|.....9| 00112: b1 06 d2 e6 0a 36 3b 7c 8b ca 86 e9 8a 16 fd 7d .....6;|.......} (00000)*a append sector (00512)*^P file: boot.rec put file w/o options? Yes putting (00512)*. exit DISKED? Yes C:> The above example saved the BOOT record of the diskette in drive A: to the disk so it could be investigated by a debugger or disassembled. DISKED page 21 Section 6 Command Summary 6.1 Movement n,N,^N next sector, cluster, track b,B,^B back sector, cluster, track st,s,h set to track t, sector s, head h Sn set to cluster n ^Sn set to logical sector n sb set to BOOT sector sf set to FAT sector 0-9 set to tagged sector 0-9 home set to root directory end set to last sector r range forward by sectors ^R range backward by sectors R range forward by clusters j jump to next cluster of file J jump to previous cluster of file ^right set to the next un-allocated cluster ^left set to the previous un-allocated cluster 6.2 Get a append sector A append cluster ^An,n append from n, n bytes g0|1|n get sectors ^G0|1|n get sectors with move 6.3 Unget u unappend sector U unappend cluster ^Un unappend n bytes e empty 6.4 Log lD log disk D ^L re-log disk 6.5 Search fs find string s on disk DISKED page 22 ^Fs find s searching backward Fs find s in file buffer 6.6 Display SPACE dump sector buffer dn dump file buffer from n vn view file buffer from n ^V view sector buffer BS display disk parameters / display command summary m display cluster map of current file M map un-allocated clusters of drive Shft-F1 top 128 bytes of sector buffer Shft-F2 full sector buffer Shft-F3 view sector buffer Shft-F4 directory display of sector buffer 6.7 Change cn change sector buffer from n Cn change file buffer from n ^C change directory k kill changes 6.8 Files ps put file buffer to file s ^Ps put with no translation to file s Pn,n,s put from n, n sectors to file s is insert file s ^Is insert file s with no translation 6.9 Miscellaneous zs change parameters Z display parameters , toggle input radix F1 display files in current directory F2 display all files on disk F3 display number of files and directories F4s change to directory s F5 re-read sector F6 append sector with 'strip' F7 append sector with 'convert' F8 append sector with 'mask' F9 append sector per translation keywords DISKED page 23 F10s set to the first sector of file s tn tag sector n T display tagged sector list x view DISKED.INI X view DISKED.SAV ^X save state ^Z restore state DISKED page 24 Section 7 Error Messages Most errors will be harmless and can be considered warnings. DOS errors will be common on damaged diskettes. The file buffer and spare buffer contents are always maintained until explicit commands empty them. Messages Invalid Boot Sector D: Cannot run. DISKED was able to read but not able to interpret the boot sector of the current drive. Select another drive or disk and try running DISKED again. Invalid Boot Sector D: Use current? DISKED was able to read but not able to interpret the boot sector of drive designated on the command line. A Y will use the current drive, any other key will exit. Drive Not Ready D: Use current? (or Retry) DISKED cannot access the drive designated on the command line, usually because the drive door is not closed or the disk is physically damaged. A Y will use the current drive, an R will retry drive D:, any other key will exit. General Failure D: Use current? DISKED cannot read the drive designated on the command line, usually because the disk is not formatted or a format that DOS cannot read (such as a 1.2/1.4M disk on XT machines). A Y will use the current drive, any other key will exit. Insufficient Memory, n There was not enough memory available for storing the cluster numbers for the particular disk, where n is the number of clusters. The 'files' keyword will be turned off. There was not enough memory for holding the FAT sectors in memory, where n is the amount of memory needed. FAT Entry Invalid, n=x The offset n into the FAT area is not valid. Indicates a corrupt FAT. "filename" Starting Cluster Number Invalid DISKED page 25 The starting cluster number for the directory entry "filename" is not a valid cluster number. Indicates a corrupt directory. Create File Error DISKED could not create the file for saving the file buffer. Could indicate to many files in the root directory. Has no effect except no file is written. Write Error DISKED could not write data to the file saving writing the file buffer. Most likely this will be due to not enough disk space. Has no effect other than a file that may not hold any or all data. Data Error (CRC) Seek Error Sector Not Found DISKED encountered a damaged sector. The bad sector will still be selected although the sector buffer will contain the last read sector's data (or garbage). Any command that was in progress will be stopped. DISKED page 26 Appendix A Anomalies Anomalies are strange functionings that will require too complicated programming to adjust, or aspects of DOS that DISKED cannot overcome. The following is a list of such phenomena. fs The string can contain null characters (a value of zero) by a \0 embedded in the string. If the first byte is a \0, then the next call to 'f' cannot be repeated with just a return. The string to be searched for will not be found if it lies across sector boundaries so keep search strings as small as possible. This may be changed if I see a need for it. sb|sf In hex mode, an sb and an sf will still set to the BOOT and the FAT. Use a leading 0 to avoid this. Some non-DOS floppy disk formats will be able to be read if they are formatted for 512 byte sectors. DISKED will read them properly but not be able to determine the correct number of sectors the disk has. There are many shareware utilities to read and write non-DOS diskettes. A future version of DISKED may provide a way to use non-DOS diskettes if the need arises. DISKED page 27 Appendix B Legal Stuff and License Agreement This text is a legal agreement between you, the licensee, and me, the program developer. By using this program, you are agreeing to abide by the terms of this agreement. If you do not agree with the terms of this agreement, promptly return the disk package (or erase it, or give it away, or do not use it). I grant to the licensee the non-exclusive right, without right to sublicense, to use this copy of DISKED software on any number of computers at any time, and to make as many copies of said software as seems fit, and to freely distribute said software so long as a fee is not taken for the program for any reason including but not limited to * media costs and copying time , with the exception of barter type goods including other shareware and public domain software. The software and accompanying documentation (magnetic or paper) are provided "As Is" without warranty of any kind, expressed or implied (although registered users will get free future versions and support). In no event shall the program developer be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential or other damages. In no event shall any other person offer a warranty of any kind, nor shall any other person offer support for the use software unless a fee, of any kind, is waivered. DISKED can be customized for anyone who requests it. Please send bug reports, suggestions, criticisms, thoughts, to: Gregg Jennings PO BOX 200 Falmouth, MA 02541-0200 (508) 540-9711 _______________________________________________________________________ * If you are willing to share this program with others for the sole reason of being monetarily compensated, you have no right to be even using it, PERIOD. DISKED page 28 Appendix C Programming Notes DISKED is NOT another utility CLONE. It was first developed around 1982; I have not tried to copy any other program; DISKED was for my own use exclusively. I realize now that it may be useful to others. DISKED uses DOS for all disk reads and writes, for all drive parameter information, and for all console I/O. DISKED does not perform any BIOS calls; only DOS interrupts are used with the purpose in mind that it should work under any standard DOS system (it has been tested on MS- DOS, PC-DOS, and Compaq-DOS). Although this may not be the fastest or the neatest way for coding this kind of a program, it is the most reliable. The reason for displaying only the first 128 bytes of each sector is two fold. First, the CP/M operating system had only 128 byte sectors and DISKED was developed on CP/M. Secondly, the displaying of data 16 bytes per line, in hex followed by ASCII is the display format that I first saw when I became involved in computers so long ago and the whole sector will not fit entirely on the screen in this format. A DOS directory is also better displayed in this format for each file's entry is 32 bytes in length (which is not just a coincidence). If any user encounters anything that may be a bug, or any errors in the operation of DISKED, a written letter to the address found above will be appreciated. If DISKED was found on a BBS, a message left there will be appreciated as well. DISKED was first conceived and developed on what is called an S-100 bus computer using the CP/M operating system as a very basic sector oriented diskette editor for used for getting back a file's data after it's directory entry had been somehow lost (something that happened fairly often in those early days), and the file could not be "un- erased" (and since DOS was modeled after CP/M, this still holds true). Special thanks must be given to someone by the name of Ward Christensen, whose CP/M program called DU, for Disk Utility, gave me the basics of low level diskette I/O to relate to. DU was (and still is if anyone has a CP/M machine) a neat utility for reading, modifying and writing diskette sectors. It lacked, however, a way of saving diskette sectors to a file. DISKED is growing almost daily; new features are being added on the fly for I am constantly finding more uses for it. If you are seriously using this program, your thoughts and criticisms will be listened to at this time -- I will seriously consider additions and changes. DISKED page 29 Appendix D Other Utilities List of recommended commercial utilities. There are not many, but I will update the list as I gather more information. If anyone has there own useful utilities a note sent to me will be appreciated. Copy II Pc (R) Deluxe Option Board by Central Point Software. This is an add-in board for PC-XT's which is meant for Apple, Amiga and Atari floppy conversions as well as copy protected backups. It comes with a really cool floppy disk editor of an unprecedented level -- it lets one view and edit stuff like the Gap and Sync bytes, Sector IDs, and all of the "real" data on the disk. It also explains what all that stuff is. I have used it to successfully copy physically damaged diskettes. I forget the price but it was worth it. Spinrite by Gibson Research Spinrite will actually repair bad sectors on a hard drive. I do not know how they can do this I swear it works. It can take a long time -- 5-10 hours -- but can be interrupted and started ^LPage 2 again later where it left off. Contents WHAT DISKED IS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 WHAT DISKED IS NOT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 REQUIREMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 TUTORIAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 1 Using DISKED . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 1.1 Documentation Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 1.1.1 Command Input Conventions . . . . . . . . . 4 1.1.2 Keyboard Input . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 2 Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 2.1 Drives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 2.2 Moving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 2.3 Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 2.4 Copying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 2.5 Storing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 2.6 Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 2.7 Displaying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 2.8 Searching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 2.9 Exiting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 2.10 Miscellaneous . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 3 DISKED Initialization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 3.1 DISKED Keywords . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 3.2 Changing DISKED Parameters . . . . . . . . . . 15 3.2.1 Outside DISKED . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 3.2.2 Inside DISKED . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 4 Hints on Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 4.1 Bad Sectors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 4.1.1 Damage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 4.1.2 Corruption . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 4.2 Recovering Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 4.2.1 Text Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 4.2.2 Executable Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 4.3 Other Uses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 5 An Example of Usage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 6 Command Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 6.1 Movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 6.2 Get . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 6.3 Unget . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 6.4 Log . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 6.5 Search . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 6.6 Display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 6.7 Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 6.8 Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 6.9 Miscellaneous . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 7 Error Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 Appendix A Anomalies 26 Appendix B Legal Stuff and License Agreement 27 Appendix C Programming Notes 28 i Appendix D Other Utilities 29 ii Tables Table 2.1: Change Formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8 Table 2.2: Directory Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8 Table 2.3: Find Control Charcters . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 iii