new IMG plugin

[aziemer]

There's a new plugin available!

It is another IMG plugin, that I wrote mainly to support imagefiles I need for Bochs (a x86 Emulator i.e. capable to run a LINUX system in a Win98 Box, similar to VMWare with a little bit less features, but open source!). It uses images located in the Windows system as floppy and harddisk on the emulated system.

Advanced features against the IMG(1) version from IvGzury are:

- long filename support
- create images of different sizes
- optionally with bootblock and (HD images only) MBR
- add/delete files/directories within IMG
- this one has a name IMaGinator

Hope it will be useful for someone else too - for me it is already!

Andreas

P.S: The first release currently in the download area is <B>BUGGY</B> It creates wrong shortnames when copying long names into an IMG (i.e. it always creates XXXXXX~1.XXX and never changes the '1'). Also double-:oops: it creates a DEBUG.TXT in C:

The latest (and less buggiest, hopefully) version is always here:
http://www.a-z-e.de/download/ImgWCX11.ZIP

Andreas

[totfun]

2aziemer Thank you for your plugin.
Do you know a program to handle drvspace image files without loading anything at startup?

[Lemmi]

Danke für Dein Plugin. Es ist wirklich sehr hilfreich. Weiter so.

Gruß

Lemmi

[aziemer]

2Lemmi

Thanks for the flowers

2totfun

At least I do not. What purpose do you have? Just looking inside the image for fun? Or do you have a crashed system? In the latter case this might help: http://users.cybercity.dk/~bse26236/batutil/help/DRVSPS.HTM

On the other hand, I did not find any information on the file structure, so a packer or better a filesystem plugin would be a hard thing to write...

Andreas

[totfun]

Hello to everybody!

2Azieme

A) "What purpose do you have?" > I use drvspace file to boot win9x from CD.

B) I used your plugin to extract (and edit) autoexec.bat from 2.88 image file and, incredible, I found autoexec.bat mixed with config.sys...If I use winimage all is ok.

Thank you for your answers

Totfun

[aziemer]

2totfun

Ooops, this shouldn't happen What about size and time of the extracted AUTOEXEC.BAT. Is it the same as shown in the image? How does the mixup look like?

Andreas

[totfun]

2Aziemer

Size and time are identical: autoexec shown with your plugin, autoexec extracted with your plugin and autoexec extracted with winimage have the same size and time

The mixup looks like the following example:

"true" autoexec:
..
AAAAAAA
AAAAAAA
..
config:
..
CCCCCCC
CCCCCCC
..
autoexec extracted with your plugin:
..
AAAACCC
CCCAAAA
..

It seems very strange...

I did not tested other files.

Totfun

[aziemer]

I just created an image with WinImage, injected some files (including my autoexec and config) and extracted it with IMaGinator - no problem!
Then I did it the other way 'round - also OK.
Maybe you can send me this special image by eMail?

Andreas

[totfun]

Maybe you can send me this special image by eMail?

Yes, I can. But how can I know your e-mail address? (In order to attach image file).

Totfun

[aziemer]

2totfun

I thought the email button below would do a mailto:xxxx ...

The eMail address is imaginator@a-z-e.de, btw. its also written in the read.me file within the download ZIP file. But - I know from myself - real programmers don't read documentation

[totfun]

2Aziemer
Check your e-mail...

[aziemer]

And again a corrected version...

In version 1.1 there was a bug when using images with more than 1 sector per cluster (2.88MB disks and HD images). In version 1.0 I copied files in sector chunks when extracting, since version 1.1 I use clustersize chunks - but still counted in sectors...

Thanks for your help, Totfun !!

Andreas

Download: http://totalcommander.a-z-e.de/ImgWCX12.ZIP

2totfun

I sent you the new version (the plugin itself only) by mail.

[totfun]

2aziemer

Unfortunately there are still problems (it seems).

Try this:
1-Create a 1.44 or 2.88 image file with some files inside.
2-Try to delete, for example, a file a time.
3-This happens: sometimes you try to delete a file but it is still there (only shown?) and when you retry there is a message "no files found".
4-An image file left in this condition, opened by winimage, crashes winimage.

(Excuse me for my english)

Totfun

[aziemer]

2totfun

Its really good have a betatester like you... Thanks again!

With your help I found 2 more bugs
1) The one with WinImage going crazy: It had to do with long filenames. I somehow managed to use the wrong EndOfString character in them, so when an image with long names was copied back to disk (no matter what size), SCANDISK tells you the names were wrong.
2) While testing with SCANDISK I found another bug that occurs when you have files with an exact multiple of the clustersize. Then a cluster too much is allocated - this doesn't harm (except for disksize) but SCANDISK is complaining.

That files just deleted are still shown in the panel is another problem I got in touch about with Christian Ghisler. It comes from TC not always reading the contents of the archive after deleteing, so that TC still shows the state before the deletetion. When this happens just try to close the archive, open a different one (also IMG) and then reopen the first one - et voila - the file's gone. (instead of opening another arch, close an reopen TC also works).

Andreas

P.S.: version with 1) and 2) corrected is V1.3
Latest version here: http://totalcommander.a-z-e.de/ImgWCX.ZIP

D.O.

[aziemer]

We now know why the "refresh bug" happens:

Total Commander rereads the contents of an archive only if the filesize or the filetime has changed. As the filesize never changes with IMG files, the only way for TC is to look at the time.
Now - as the filetime only has a resolution of 2 seconds - when you delete a file and then the next in less than 2 seconds later, TC sees no change in filetime and does not reread the contents!
The result is, that the panel still shows your file, while in the image it is already deleted. If you now try to delete the file again, the plugin complains that there is no data to delete!
I'm currently discussing this issue with Christian, so stay tuned...

Meanwhile, just wait 2 seconds between each delete action

Andreas[face=arial][/face][face=comicsansms][/face][face=courier][/face]