mtools.1(3) MTOOLS (14mar1997) mtools.1(3)
Name
mtools - utilities to access DOS disks in Unix.
Introduction
Mtools is a public domain collection of tools to allow Unix
systems to manipulate MS-DOS files: read, write, and move
around files on an MS-DOS filesystem (typically a floppy
disk). Where reasonable, each program attempts to emulate
the MS-DOS equivalent command. However, unnecessary
restrictions and oddities of DOS are not emulated. For
instance, it is possible to move subdirectories from one
subdirectory to another.
Mtools is sufficient to give access to MS-DOS filesystems.
For instance, commands such as mdir a: work on the a: floppy
without any preliminary mounting or initialization (assuming
the default `/etc/mtools.conf' works on your machine). With
mtools, one can change floppies too without unmounting and
mounting.
Where to get mtools
Mtools can be found at the following places (and their
mirrors):
http://mtools.linux.lu/mtools-3.9.1.tar.gz
ftp://www.tux.org/pub/knaff/mtools/mtools-3.9.1.tar.gz
ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/utils/disk-management/mtools-3.9.1.tar.gz
Before reporting a bug, make sure that it has not yet been
fixed in the Alpha patches which can be found at:
http://mtools.linux.lu/
ftp://www.tux.org/pub/knaff/mtools
These patches are named mtools-version-ddmm.taz, where
version stands for the base version, dd for the day and mm
for the month. Due to a lack of space, I usually leave only
the most recent patch.
There is an mtools mailing list at mtools @ tux.org .
Please send all bug reports to this list. You may subscribe
to the list by sending a message with 'subscribe mtools @
tux.org' in its body to majordomo @ tux.org . (N.B. Please
remove the spaces around the "@" both times. I left them
there in order to fool spambots.) Announcements of new
mtools versions will also be sent to the list, in addition
to the linux announce newsgroups. The mailing list is
archived at http://www.tux.org/hypermail/mtools/latest
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Common features of all mtools commands
Options and filenames
MS-DOS filenames are composed of a drive letter followed by
a colon, a subdirectory, and a filename. Only the filename
part is mandatory, the drive letter and the subdirectory are
optional. Filenames without a drive letter refer to Unix
files. Subdirectory names can use either the '/' or '\'
separator. The use of the '\' separator or wildcards
requires the names to be enclosed in quotes to protect them
from the shell. However, wildcards in Unix filenames should
not be enclosed in quotes, because here we want the shell to
expand them.
The regular expression "pattern matching" routines follow
the Unix-style rules. For example, `*' matches all MS-DOS
files in lieu of `*.*'. The archive, hidden, read-only and
system attribute bits are ignored during pattern matching.
All options use the - (minus) as their first character, not
/ as you'd expect in MS-DOS.
Most mtools commands allow multiple filename parameters,
which doesn't follow MS-DOS conventions, but which is more
user-friendly.
Most mtools commands allow options that instruct them how to
handle file name clashes. See section name clashes, for more
details on these. All commands accept the -V flags which
prints the version, and most accept the -v flag, which
switches on verbose mode. In verbose mode, these commands
print out the name of the MS-DOS files upon which they act,
unless stated otherwise. See section Commands, for a
description of the options which are specific to each
command.
Drive letters
The meaning of the drive letters depends on the target
architectures. However, on most target architectures, drive
A is the first floppy drive, drive B is the second floppy
drive (if available), drive J is a Jaz drive (if available),
and drive Z is a Zip drive (if available). On those systems
where the device name is derived from the SCSI id, the Jaz
drive is assumed to be at Scsi target 4, and the Zip at Scsi
target 5 (factory default settings). On Linux, both drives
are assumed to be the second drive on the Scsi bus
(/dev/sdb). The default settings can be changes using a
configuration file (See section Configuration).
Current working directory
The mcd command (`mcd') is used to establish the device and
the current working directory (relative to the MS-DOS
filesystem), otherwise the default is assumed to be A:/.
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However, unlike MS-DOS, there is only one working directory
for all drives, and not one per drive.
VFAT-style long file names
This version of mtools supports VFAT style long filenames.
If a Unix filename is too long to fit in a short DOS name,
it is stored as a VFAT long name, and a companion short name
is generated. This short name is what you see when you
examine the disk with a pre-7.0 version of DOS.
The following table shows some examples of short names:
Long name MS-DOS name Reason for the change
----------------------------------------
thisisatest THISIS~1 filename too long
alain.knaff ALAIN~1.KNA extension too long
prn.txt PRN~1.TXT PRN is a device name
.abc ABC~1 null filename
hot+cold HOT_CO~1 illegal character
As you see, the following transformations happen to derive
a short name:
* Illegal characters are replaced by underscores. The
illegal characters are ;+=[]',\"*\\<>/?:|.
* Extra dots, which cannot be interpreted as a main
name/extension separator are removed
* A ~n number is generated,
* The name is shortened so as to fit in the 8+3
limitation
The initial Unix-style file name (whether long or short) is
also called the primary name, and the derived short name is
also called the secondary name.
Example:
mcopy /etc/motd a:Reallylongname
Mtools creates a VFAT entry for Reallylongname, and uses
REALLYLO as a short name. Reallylongname is the primary
name, and REALLYLO is the secondary name.
mcopy /etc/motd a:motd
Motd fits into the DOS filename limits. Mtools doesn't need
to derivate another name. Motd is the primary name, and
there is no secondary name.
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In a nutshell: The primary name is the long name, if one
exists, or the short name if there is no long name.
Although VFAT is much more flexible than FAT, there are
still names that are not acceptable, even in VFAT. There are
still some illegal characters left (\"*\\<>/?:|), and device
names are still reserved.
Unix name Long name Reason for the change
----------------------------------------
prn prn-1 PRN is a device name
ab:c ab_c-1 illegal character
As you see, the following transformations happen if a long
name is illegal:
* Illegal characters are replaces by underscores,
* A -n number is generated,
Name clashes
When writing a file to disk, its long name or short name may
collide with an already existing file or directory. This may
happen for all commands which create new directory entries,
such as mcopy, mmd, mren, mmove, mwrite and mread. When a
name clash happens, mtools asks you what it should do. It
offers several choices:
overwrite
Overwrites the existing file. It is not possible to
overwrite a directory with a file.
rename
Renames the newly created file. Mtools prompts for the
new filename
autorename
Renames the newly created file. Mtools chooses a name
by itself, without prompting
skip
Gives up on this file, and moves on to the next (if
any)
To chose one of these actions, type its first letter at the
prompt. If you use a lower case letter, the action only
applies for this file only, if you use an upper case letter,
the action applies to all files, and you won't be prompted
again.
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You may also chose actions (for all files) on the command
line, when invoking mtools:
-o Overwrites primary names by default.
-O Overwrites secondary names by default.
-r Renames primary name by default.
-R Renames secondary name by default.
-a Autorenames primary name by default.
-A Autorenames secondary name by default.
-s Skip primary name by default.
-S Skip secondary name by default.
-m Ask user what to do with primary name.
-M Ask user what to do with secondary name.
Note that for command line switches lower/upper
differentiates between primary/secondary name whereas for
interactive choices, lower/upper differentiates between
just-this-time/always.
The primary name is the name as displayed in Windows 95 or
Windows NT: i.e. the long name if it exists, and the short
name otherwise. The secondary name is the "hidden" name,
i.e. the short name if a long name exists.
By default, the user is prompted if the primary name
clashes, and the secondary name is autorenamed.
If a name clash occurs in a Unix directory, mtools only asks
whether to overwrite the file, or to skip it.
Case sensitivity of the VFAT filesystem
The VFAT filesystem is able to remember the case of the
filenames. However, filenames which differ only in case are
not allowed to coexist in the same directory. For example if
you store a file called LongFileName on a VFAT filesystem,
mdir shows this file as LongFileName, and not as
Longfilename. However, if you then try to add LongFilename
to the same directory, it is refused, because case is
ignored for clash checks.
The VFAT filesystem allows to store the case of a filename
in the attribute byte, if all letters of the filename are
the same case, and if all letters of the extension are the
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same case too. Mtools uses this information when displaying
the files, and also to generate the Unix filename when
mcopying to a Unix directory. This may have unexpected
results when applied to files written using an pre-7.0
version of DOS: Indeed, the old style filenames map to all
upper case. This is different from the behavior of the old
version of mtools which used to generate lower case Unix
filenames.
high capacity formats
Mtools supports a number of formats which allow to store
more data on disk as usual. Due to different operating
system abilities, these formats are not supported on all
OS'es. Mtools recognizes these formats transparently where
supported.
In order to format these disks, you need to use an operating
system specific tool. For Linux, suitable floppy tools can
be found in the fdutils package at the following locations~:
ftp://www.tux.org/pub/knaff/fdutils/.
ftp://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/utils/disk-management/fdutils-*
See the manpages included in that package for further
detail: Use superformat to format all formats except XDF,
and use xdfcopy to format XDF.
More sectors
The oldest method of fitting more data on a disk is to use
more sectors and more cylinders. Although the standard
format uses 80 cylinders and 18 sectors (on a 3 1/2 high
density disk), it is possible to use up to 83 cylinders (on
most drives) and up to 21 sectors. This method allows to
store up to 1743K on a 3 1/2 HD disk. However, 21 sector
disks are twice as slow as the standard 18 sector disks
because the sectors are packed so close together that we
need to interleave them. This problem doesn't exist for 20
sector formats.
These formats are supported by numerous DOS shareware
utilities such as fdformat and vgacopy. In his infinite
hybris, Bill Gate$ believed that he invented this, and
called it `DMF disks', or `Windows formatted disks'. But in
reality, it has already existed years before! Mtools
supports these formats on Linux, on SunOs and on the DELL
Unix PC.
Bigger sectors
By using bigger sectors it is possible to go beyond the
capacity which can be obtained by the standard 512-byte
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sectors. This is because of the sector header. The sector
header has the same size, regardless of how many data bytes
are in the sector. Thus, we save some space by using fewer,
but bigger sectors. For example, 1 sector of 4K only takes
up header space once, whereas 8 sectors of 512 bytes have
also 8 headers, for the same amount of useful data.
This method allows to store up to 1992K on a 3 1/2 HD disk.
Mtools supports these formats only on Linux.
2m
The 2m format was originally invented by Ciriaco Garcia de
Celis. It also uses bigger sectors than usual in order to
fit more data on the disk. However, it uses the standard
format (18 sectors of 512 bytes each) on the first cylinder,
in order to make these disks easyer to handle by DOS. Indeed
this method allows to have a standard sized bootsector,
which contains a description of how the rest of the disk
should be read.
However, the drawback of this is that the first cylinder can
hold less data than the others. Unfortunately, DOS can only
handle disks where each track contains the same amount of
data. Thus 2m hides the fact that the first track contains
less data by using a shadow FAT. (Usually, DOS stores the
FAT in two identical copies, for additional safety. XDF
stores only one copy, and it tells DOS that it stores two.
Thus the same that would be taken up by the second FAT copy
is saved.) This also means that your should never use a 2m
disk to store anything else than a DOS fs.
Mtools supports these format only on Linux.
XDF
XDF is a high capacity format used by OS/2. It can hold 1840
K per disk. That's lower than the best 2m formats, but its
main advantage is that it is fast: 600 milliseconds per
track. That's faster than the 21 sector format, and almost
as fast as the standard 18 sector format. In order to access
these disks, make sure mtools has been compiled with XDF
support, and set the use_xdf variable for the drive in the
configuration file. See section Compiling mtools and `misc
variables', for details on how to do this. Fast XDF access
is only available for Linux kernels which are more recent
than 1.1.34.
Mtools supports this format only on Linux.
Caution / Attention distributors: If mtools is compiled on a
Linux kernel more recent than 1.3.34, it won't run on an
older kernel. However, if it has been compiled on an older
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kernel, it still runs on a newer kernel, except that XDF
access is slower. It is recommended that distribution
authors only include mtools binaries compiled on kernels
older than 1.3.34 until 2.0 comes out. When 2.0 will be out,
mtools binaries compiled on newer kernels may (and should)
be distributed. Mtools binaries compiled on kernels older
than 1.3.34 won't run on any 2.1 kernel or later.
Exit codes
All the Mtools commands return 0 on success, 1 on utter
failure, or 2 on partial failure. All the Mtools commands
perform a few sanity checks before going ahead, to make sure
that the disk is indeed an MS-DOS disk (as opposed to, say
an ext2 or minix disk). These checks may reject partially
corrupted disks, which might otherwise still be readable. To
avoid these checks, set the MTOOLS_SKIP_CHECK environmental
variable or the corresponding configuration file variable
(see section global variables)
Bugs
An unfortunate side effect of not guessing the proper device
(when multiple disk capacities are supported) is an
occasional error message from the device driver. These can
be safely ignored.
The fat checking code chokes on 1.72 Mb disks mformatted
with pre-2.0.7 mtools. Set the environmental variable
MTOOLS_FAT_COMPATIBILITY (or the corresponding configuration
file variable, `global variables') to bypass the fat
checking.
How to configure mtools for your environment
Description
This sections explains the syntax of the configurations
files for mtools. The configuration files are called
`/usr/freeware/etc/mtools.conf' and `~/.mtoolsrc'. If the
environmental variable MTOOLSRC is set, its contents is used
as the filename for a third configuration file. These
configuration files describe the following items:
* Global configuration flags and variables
* Per drive flags and variables
* Character translation tables
Location of the configuration files
`/usr/freeware/etc/mtools.conf' is the system-wide
configuration file, and `~/.mtoolsrc' is the user's private
configuration file.
On some systems, the system-wide configuration file is
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called `/etc/defaults/mtools.conf' instead.
General configuration file syntax
The configuration files is made up of sections. Each section
starts with a keyword identifying the section followed by a
colon. Then follow variable assignments and flags. Variable
assignments take the following form: name=value
Flags are lone keywords without an equal sign and value
following them. A section either ends at the end of the
file or where the next section begins.
Lines starting with a hash (#) are comments. Newline
characters are equivalent to whitespace (except where ending
a comment). The configuration file is case insensitive,
except for item enclosed in quotes (such as filenames).
Default values
For most platforms, mtools contains reasonable compiled-in
defaults for physical floppy drives. Thus, you usually
don't need to bother with the configuration file, if all you
want to do with mtools is to access your floppy drives. On
the other hand, the configuration file is needed if you also
want to use mtools to access your hard disk partitions and
dosemu image files.
Global variables
Global flags may be set to 1 or to 0.
The following global flags are recognized:
MTOOLS_SKIP_CHECK
If this is set to 1, mtools skips most of its sanity
checks. This is needed to read some Atari disks which
have been made with the earlier ROMs, and which would
not be recognized otherwise.
MTOOLS_FAT_COMPATIBILITY
If this is set to 1, mtools skips the fat size checks.
Some disks have a bigger FAT than they really need to.
These are rejected if this option is not set.
MTOOLS_LOWER_CASE
If this is set to 1, mtools displays all-upper-case
short filenames as lowercase. This has been done to
allow a behavior which is consistent with older
versions of mtools which didn't know about the case
bits.
MTOOLS_NO_VFAT
If this is set to 1, mtools won't generate VFAT entries
for filenames which are mixed-case, but otherwise legal
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dos filenames. This is useful when working with DOS
versions which can't grok VFAT longnames, such as
FreeDos.
MTOOLS_DOTTED_DIR
In a wide directory, prints the short name with a dot
instead of spaces separating the basename and the
extension.
MTOOLS_NAME_NUMERIC_TAIL
If this is set to one (default), generate numeric tails
for all long names (~1). If set to zero, only generate
numeric tails if otherwise a clash would have happened.
MTOOLS_TWENTY_FOUR_HOUR_CLOCK
If 1, uses the European notation for times (twenty four
hour clock), else uses the UK/US notation (am/pm)
Example: Inserting the following line into your
configuration file instructs mtools to skip the sanity
checks:
MTOOLS_SKIP_CHECK=1
Global variables may also be set via the environment:
export MTOOLS_SKIP_CHECK=1
Global string variables may be set to any value:
MTOOLS_DATE_STRING
The format used for printing dates of files. By
default, is dd-mm-yyyy.
Per drive flags and variables
General information
Per drive flags and values may be described in a drive
section. A drive section starts with drive "driveletter" :
Then follow variable-value pairs and flags.
This is a sample drive description:
drive a:
file="/dev/fd0" use_xdf=1
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Disk Geometry Configuration
Geometry information describes the physical characteristics
about the disk. Its has three purposes:
formatting
The geometry information is written into the boot
sector of the newly made disk. However, you may also
describe the geometry information on the command line.
See section mformat for details.
filtering
On some Unices there are device nodes which only
support one physical geometry. For instance, you might
need a different node to access a disk as high density
or as low density. The geometry is compared to the
actual geometry stored on the boot sector to make sure
that this device node is able to correctly read the
disk. If the geometry doesn't match, this drive entry
fails, and the next drive entry bearing the same drive
letter is tried. See section multiple descriptions for
more details on supplying several descriptions for one
drive letter.
If no geometry information is supplied in the
configuration file, all disks are accepted. On Linux
(and on Sparc) there exist device nodes with
configurable geometry (`/dev/fd0', `/dev/fd1' etc), and
thus filtering is not needed (and ignored) for disk
drives. (Mtools still does do filtering on plain files
(disk images) in Linux: this is mainly intended for
test purposes, as I don't have access to a Unix which
would actually need filtering).
If you do not need filtering, but want still a default
geometry for mformatting, you may switch off filtering
using the mformat_only flag.
initial geometry
On devices that support it (usually floppy devices),
the geometry information is also used to set the
initial geometry. This initial geometry is applied
while reading the boot sector, which contains the real
geometry. If no geometry information is supplied in
the configuration file, or if the mformat_only flag is
supplied, no initial configuration is done.
On Linux, initial geometry is not really needed, as the
configurable devices are able to auto-detect the disk
type accurately enough (for most common formats) to
read the boot sector.
Wrong geometry information may lead to very bizarre errors.
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That's why I strongly recommend that you add the
mformat_only flag to your drive description, unless you
really need filtering or initial geometry.
The following geometry related variables are available:
cylinders
tracks
The number of cylinders. (cylinders is the preferred
form, tracks is considered obsolete)
heads
The number of heads (sides).
sectors
The number of sectors per track.
Example: the following drive section describes a 1.44M
drive:
drive a:
file="/dev/fd0H1440"
fat_bits=12
cylinders=80 heads=2 sectors=18
The following shorthand geometry descriptions are available:
1.44m
high density 3 1/2 disk. Equivalent to: fat_bits=12
cylinders=80 heads=2 sectors=18
1.2m
high density 5 1/4 disk. Equivalent to: fat_bits=12
cylinders=80 heads=2 sectors=15
720k
double density 3 1/2 disk. Equivalent to: fat_bits=12
cylinders=80 heads=2 sectors=9
360k
double density 5 1/4 disk. Equivalent to: fat_bits=12
cylinders=40 heads=2 sectors=9
The shorthand format descriptions may be amended. For
example, 360k sectors=8 describes a 320k disk and is
equivalent to: fat_bits=12 cylinders=40 heads=2 sectors=8
Open Flags
Moreover, the following flags are available:
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sync
All i/o operations are done synchronously
nodelay
The device or file is opened with the O_NDELAY flag.
This is needed on some non-Linux architectures.
exclusive
The device or file is opened with the O_EXCL flag. On
Linux, this ensures exclusive access to the floppy
drive. On most other architectures, and for plain files
it has no effect at all.
General Purpose Drive Variables
The following general purpose drive variables are available.
Depending to their type, these variables can be set to a
string (file, precmd) or an integer (all others)
file
The name of the file or device holding the disk image.
This is mandatory. The file name should be enclosed in
quotes.
partition
Tells mtools to treat the drive as a partitioned
device, and to use the given partition. Only primary
partitions are accessible using this method, and they
are numbered from 1 to 4. For logical partitions, use
the more general offset variable. The partition
variable is intended for removable media such as
Syquests, ZIP drives, and magneto-optical disks.
Although traditional DOS sees Syquests and magneto-
optical disks as `giant floppy disks' which are
unpartitioned, OS/2 and Windows NT treat them like hard
disks, i.e. partioned devices. The partition flag is
also useful DOSEMU hdimages. It is not recommended for
hard disks for which direct access to partitions is
available through mounting.
offset
Describes where in the file the MS-DOS filesystem
starts. This is useful for logical partitions in DOSEMU
hdimages, and for ATARI ram disks. By default, this is
zero, meaning that the filesystem starts right at the
beginning of the device or file.
fat_bits
The number of FAT bits. This may be 12 or 16. This is
very rarely needed, as it can almost always be deduced
from information in the boot sector. On the contrary,
describing the number of fat bits may actually be
harmful if you get it wrong. You should only use it if
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or if you want to mformat a disk with a weird number of
fat bits.
precmd
On some variants of Solaris, it is necessary to call
'volcheck -v' before opening a floppy device, in order
for the system to notice that there is indeed a disk in
the drive. precmd="volcheck -v" in the drive clause
establishes the desired behavior.
blocksize
This parameter represents a default block size to be
always used on this device. All I/O is done with
multiples of this block size, independantly of the
sector size registered in the filesystem's boot sector.
This is useful for character devices whose sector size
is not 512, such as for example CD Rom drives on
Solaris.
Only the file variable is mandatory. The other parameters
may be left out. In that case a default value or an
autodetected value is used.
General Purpose Drive Flags
A flag can either be set to 1 (enabled) or 0 (disabled). If
the value is ommitted, it is enabled. For example, scsi is
equivalent to scsi=1
nolock
Instruct mtools to not use locking on this drive. This
is needed on systems with buggy locking semantics.
However, enabling this makes operation less safe in
cases where several users may access the same drive at
the same time.
scsi
When set to 1, this option tells mtools to use raw SCSI
I/O instead of the standard read/write calls to access
the device. Currently, this is supported on HP/UX,
Solaris and SunOs. This is needed because on some
architectures, such as SunOs or Solaris, PC media can't
be accessed using the read and write syscalls, because
the OS expects them to contain a Sun specific "disk
label".
As raw Scsi access always uses the whole device, you
need to specify the "partition" flag in addition
On some architectures, such as Solaris, mtools needs
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root privileges to be able to use the scsi option.
Thus mtools should be installed set uid root on Solaris
if you want to access Zip/Jaz drives. Thus, if the
scsi flag is given, privileged is automatically
implied, unless explicitly disabled by privileged=0
Mtools uses its root privileges to open the device, and
to issue the actual SCSI I/O calls. Moreover, root
privileges are only used for drives described in a
system-wide configuration file such as
`/usr/freeware/etc/mtools.conf', and not for those
described in `~/.mtoolsrc' or `$MTOOLSRC'.
privileged
When set to 1, this instructs mtools to use its set-uid
and set-gid privileges for opening the given drive.
This option is only valid for drives described in the
system-wide configuration files (such as
`/usr/freeware/etc/mtools.conf', not `~/.mtoolsrc' or
`$MTOOLSRC'). Obviously, this option is also a no op
if mtools is not installed setuid or setgid. This
option is implied by 'scsi=1', but again only for
drives defined in system-wide configuration files.
Privileged may also be set explicitely to 0, in order
to tell mtools not to use its privileges for a given
drive even if scsi=1 is set.
Mtools only needs to be installed setuid if you use the
privileged or scsi drive variables. If you do not use
these options, mtools works perfectly well even when
not installed setuid root.
vold
Instructs mtools to interpret the device name as a vold
identifier rather than as a filename. The vold
identifier is translated into a real filename using the
media_findname() and media_oldaliases() functions of
the volmgt library. This flag is only available if you
configured mtools with the --enable-new-vold option
before compilation.
use_xdf
If this is set to a non-zero value, mtools also tries
to access this disk as an XDF disk. XDF is a high
capacity format used by OS/2. This is off by default.
See section XDF for more details.
mformat_only
Tells mtools to use the geometry for this drive only
for mformatting and not for filtering.
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remote
Tells mtools to connect to floppyd (See section
floppyd).
Supplying multiple descriptions for a drive
It is possible to supply multiple descriptions for a drive.
In that case, the descriptions are tried in order until one
is found that fits. Descriptions may fail for several
reasons:
1. because the geometry is not appropriate,
2. because there is no disk in the drive,
3. or because of other problems.
Multiple definitions are useful when using physical devices
which are only able to support one single disk geometry.
Example:
drive a: file="/dev/fd0H1440" 1.44m
drive a: file="/dev/fd0H720" 720k
This instructs mtools to use /dev/fd0H1440 for 1.44m (high
density) disks and /dev/fd0H720 for 720k (double density)
disks. On Linux, this feature is not really needed, as the
/dev/fd0 device is able to handle any geometry.
You may also use multiple drive descriptions to access both
of your physical drives through one drive letter:
drive z: file="/dev/fd0"
drive z: file="/dev/fd1"
With this description, mdir z: accesses your first physical
drive if it contains a disk. If the first drive doesn't
contain a disk, mtools checks the second drive.
When using multiple configuration files, drive descriptions
in the files parsed last override descriptions for the same
drive in earlier files. In order to avoid this, use the
drive+ or +drive keywords instead of drive. The first adds a
description to the end of the list (i.e. it will be tried
last), and the first adds it to the start of the list.
Character set translation tables
If you live in the USA, in Western Europe or in Australia,
you may skip this section.
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Why character set translation tables are needed
DOS uses a different character code mapping than Unix. 7-bit
characters still have the same meaning, only characters with
the eight bit set are affected. To make matters worse, there
are several translation tables available depending on the
country where you are. The appearance of the characters is
defined using code pages. These code pages aren't the same
for all countries. For instance, some code pages don't
contain upper case accented characters. On the other hand,
some code pages contain characters which don't exist in
Unix, such as certain line-drawing characters or accented
consonants used by some Eastern European countries. This
affects two things, relating to filenames:
upper case characters
In short names, only upper case characters are allowed.
This also holds for accented characters. For instance,
in a code page which doesn't contain accented uppercase
characters, the accented lowercase characters get
transformed into their unaccented counterparts.
long file names
Micro$oft has finally come to their senses and uses a
more standard mapping for the long file names. They use
Unicode, which is basically a 32 bit version of ASCII.
Its first 256 characters are identical to Unix ASCII.
Thus, the code page also affects the correspondence
between the codes used in long names and those used in
short names
Mtools considers the filenames entered on the command line
as having the Unix mapping, and translates the characters to
get short names. By default, code page 850 is used with the
Swiss uppercase/lowercase mapping. I chose this code page,
because its set of existing characters most closely matches
Unix's. Moreover, this code page covers most characters in
use in the USA, Australia and Western Europe. However, it is
still possible to chose a different mapping. There are two
methods: the country variable and explicit tables.
Configuration using Country
The COUNTRY variable is recommended for people which also
have access to MS-DOS system files and documentation. If you
don't have access to these, I'd suggest you'd rather use
explicit tables instead.
Syntax:
COUNTRY="country[,[codepage], country-file]"
This tells mtools to use a Unix-to-DOS translation table
which matches codepage and an lowercase-to-uppercase table
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for country and to use the country-file file to get the
lowercase-to-uppercase table. The country code is most often
the telephone prefix of the country. Refer to the DOS help
page on "country" for more details. The codepage and the
country-file parameters are optional. Please don't type in
the square brackets, they are only there to say which
parameters are optional. The country-file file is supplied
with MS-DOS, and is usually called `COUNTRY.SYS', and stored
in the `C:\DOS' directory. In most cases you don't need it,
as the most common translation tables are compiled into
mtools. So, don't worry if you run a Unix-only box which
lacks this file.
If codepage is not given, a per country default code page is
used. If the country-file parameter isn't given, compiled-in
defaults are used for the lowercase-to-uppercase table. This
is useful for other Unices than Linux, which may have no
`COUNTRY.SYS' file available online.
The Unix-to-DOS are not contained in the `COUNTRY.SYS' file,
and thus mtools always uses compiled-in defaults for those.
Thus, only a limited amount of code pages are supported. If
your preferred code page is missing, or if you know the name
of the Windows 95 file which contains this mapping, could
you please drop me a line at alain@linux.lu.
The COUNTRY variable can also be set using the environment.
Configuration using explicit translation tables
Translation tables may be described in line in the
configuration file. Two tables are needed: first the DOS-
to-Unix table, and then the Lowercase-to-Uppercase table. A
DOS-to-Unix table starts with the tounix keyword, followed
by a colon, and 128 hexadecimal numbers. A lower-to-upper
table starts with the fucase keyword, followed by a colon,
and 128 hexadecimal numbers.
The tables only show the translations for characters whose
codes is greater than 128, because translation for lower
codes is trivial.
Example:
tounix:
0xc7 0xfc 0xe9 0xe2 0xe4 0xe0 0xe5 0xe7
0xea 0xeb 0xe8 0xef 0xee 0xec 0xc4 0xc5
0xc9 0xe6 0xc6 0xf4 0xf6 0xf2 0xfb 0xf9
0xff 0xd6 0xdc 0xf8 0xa3 0xd8 0xd7 0x5f
0xe1 0xed 0xf3 0xfa 0xf1 0xd1 0xaa 0xba
0xbf 0xae 0xac 0xbd 0xbc 0xa1 0xab 0xbb
0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0xc1 0xc2 0xc0
0xa9 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0xa2 0xa5 0xac
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0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0xe3 0xc3
0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0xa4
0xf0 0xd0 0xc9 0xcb 0xc8 0x69 0xcd 0xce
0xcf 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x5f 0x7c 0x49 0x5f
0xd3 0xdf 0xd4 0xd2 0xf5 0xd5 0xb5 0xfe
0xde 0xda 0xd9 0xfd 0xdd 0xde 0xaf 0xb4
0xad 0xb1 0x5f 0xbe 0xb6 0xa7 0xf7 0xb8
0xb0 0xa8 0xb7 0xb9 0xb3 0xb2 0x5f 0x5f
fucase:
0x80 0x9a 0x90 0xb6 0x8e 0xb7 0x8f 0x80
0xd2 0xd3 0xd4 0xd8 0xd7 0xde 0x8e 0x8f
0x90 0x92 0x92 0xe2 0x99 0xe3 0xea 0xeb
0x59 0x99 0x9a 0x9d 0x9c 0x9d 0x9e 0x9f
0xb5 0xd6 0xe0 0xe9 0xa5 0xa5 0xa6 0xa7
0xa8 0xa9 0xaa 0xab 0xac 0xad 0xae 0xaf
0xb0 0xb1 0xb2 0xb3 0xb4 0xb5 0xb6 0xb7
0xb8 0xb9 0xba 0xbb 0xbc 0xbd 0xbe 0xbf
0xc0 0xc1 0xc2 0xc3 0xc4 0xc5 0xc7 0xc7
0xc8 0xc9 0xca 0xcb 0xcc 0xcd 0xce 0xcf
0xd1 0xd1 0xd2 0xd3 0xd4 0x49 0xd6 0xd7
0xd8 0xd9 0xda 0xdb 0xdc 0xdd 0xde 0xdf
0xe0 0xe1 0xe2 0xe3 0xe5 0xe5 0xe6 0xe8
0xe8 0xe9 0xea 0xeb 0xed 0xed 0xee 0xef
0xf0 0xf1 0xf2 0xf3 0xf4 0xf5 0xf6 0xf7
0xf8 0xf9 0xfa 0xfb 0xfc 0xfd 0xfe 0xff
The first table maps DOS character codes to Unix character
codes. For example, the DOS character number 129. This is a
u with to dots on top of it. To translate it into Unix, we
look at the character number 1 in the first table (1 = 129 -
128). This is 0xfc. (Beware, numbering starts at 0). The
second table maps lower case DOS characters to upper case
DOS characters. The same lower case u with dots maps to
character 0x9a, which is an uppercase U with dots in DOS.
Unicode characters greater than 256
If an existing MS-DOS name contains Unicode character
greater than 256, these are translated to underscores or to
characters which are close in visual appearance. For
example, accented consonants are translated into their
unaccented counterparts. This translation is used for mdir
and for the Unix filenames generated by mcopy. Linux does
support Unicode too, but unfortunately too few applications
support it yet to bother with it in mtools. Most
importantly, xterm can't display Unicode yet. If there is
sufficient demand, I might include support for Unicode in
the Unix filenames as well.
Caution: When deleting files with mtools, the underscore
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matches all characters which can't be represented in Unix.
Be careful with mdel!
Location of configuration files and parsing order
The configuration files are parsed in the following order:
1. compiled-in defaults
2. `/usr/freeware/etc/mtools.conf'
3. `/etc/mtools' This is for backwards compatibility only,
and is only parsed if `mtools.conf' doesn't exist.
4. `~/.mtoolsrc'.
5. `$MTOOLSRC' (file pointed by the MTOOLSRC environmental
variable)
Options described in the later files override those
described in the earlier files. Drives defined in earlier
files persist if they are not overridden in the later files.
For instance, drives A and B may be defined in
`/usr/freeware/etc/mtools.conf' and drives C and D may be
defined in `~/.mtoolsrc' However, if `~/.mtoolsrc' also
defines drive A, this new description would override the
description of drive A in `/usr/freeware/etc/mtools.conf'
instead of adding to it. If you want to add a new
description to a drive already described in an earlier file,
you need to use either the +drive or drive+ keyword.
Backwards compatibility with old configuration file syntax
The syntax described herein is new for version mtools-3.0.
The old line-oriented syntax is still supported. Each line
beginning with a single letter is considered to be a drive
description using the old syntax. Old style and new style
drive sections may be mixed within the same configuration
file, in order to make upgrading easier. Support for the old
syntax will be phased out eventually, and in order to
discourage its use, I purposefully omit its description
here.
Command list
This section describes the available mtools commands, and
the command line parameters that each of them accepts.
Options which are common to all mtools commands are not
described here, `arguments' for a description of those.
Floppyd
Floppyd is used as a server to grant access to the floppy
drive to clients running on a remote machine, just as an X
server grants access to the display to remote clients. It
has the following syntax:
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floppyd [-d] [-l] [-s port] [-r user] [-b ipaddr] devicename
[displaynames]
floppyd is always associated with an X server. It runs on
the same machine as its X server, and listens on port 5703
and above.
Authentication
floppyd authenticates remote clients using the Xauthority
protocol. Xhost authentication is not supported. Each
floppyd is associated with an X server. When a remote
client attempts to connect to floppyd, it sends floppyd the
X authority record corresponding to floppyd's X server.
Floppyd in turn then tries to open up a connection to the X
server in order to verify the authenticity of the xauth
record. If the connection to the X server succeeds, the
client is granted access
Caution: In order to make authentication work correctly, the
local host should not be listed in the xhost list of allowed
hosts.
Indeed, hosts listed in xhost do not need a correct
Xauthority cookie to connect to the X server. As floppyd
runs on the same host as the X server, all its probe
connection would succeed even for clients who supplied a bad
cookie. This means that your floppy drive would be open to
the world, i.e. a huge security hole.
If your X server does not allow you to remove localhost:0
and :0 from the xhost list, you can prevent floppyd from
probing those display names with the -l option.
Command line options
d Daemon mode. Floppyd runs its own server loop. Do not
supply this if you start floppyd from inetd.conf
s port
Port number for deamon mode. Default is 5703 +
displaynumber. This flag implies daemon mode. For
example, for display hitchhiker:5, the port would be
5708.
b ipaddr
Bind address (for multihomed hosts). This flag implies
daemon mode
r user
Run the server under as the given user
l Do not generate local default display names
devicename is the name of the device node to be opened.
Default is /dev/fd0.
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displaynames is a list of display names to connect to for
authentication. All displays in the list are tried until
one is found that grants access or until the list is
exhausted. If no list is supplied, the a display name list
based on the ip address supplied using the -b flag is
constructed: ipaddr:n.0.
* :n.0
If floppyd is started from inetd, the address of the
socket used for stdin is used as a bind address.
If no bind address is supplied, a list containing the
following 3 items is constructed:
* hostname:n.0
* localhost:n.0
* :n.0
n is the display number derived from the port number (port
- 5703 modulo 10). The local items (localhost:0 and :0) are
not constructed if the -l flag is given.
Connecting to floppyd
In order to use floppyd, add the flag remote to the device
description in your `~/.mtoolsrc' file. If the flag remote
is given, the file parameter of the device description is
taken to be a remote address. It's format is the following:
hostname:displaynumber[/baseport]. When using this entry,
mtools connects to port baseport+displaynumber at hostname.
By default baseport is 5703.
Examples:
The following starts a floppy daemon giving access to
`/dev/fd0', listening on the default port 5703, tied to the
default X servers:
floppyd -d /dev/fd0
Each of the following starts a floppy daemon giving access
to `/dev/fd1', tied to the :1 local X servers, and listening
on port 5704. We assume that the local host is named
hitchhiker.
floppyd -d /dev/fd0 localhost:1 hitchhiker:1 :1
floppyd -p 5704 /dev/fd0
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If you want to start floppyd by inetd instead of running it
as a daemon, insert the following lines into
`/etc/services':
# floppy daemon
floppyd-0 5703/tcp # floppy daemon for X server :0
floppyd-1 5704/tcp # floppy daemon for X server :1
And insert the following into `/etc/inetd.conf' (assuming
that you have defined a user named floppy in your
`/etc/passwd'):
# floppy daemon
floppyd-0 stream tcp wait floppy /usr/sbin/floppyd floppyd /dev/fd0
floppyd-1 stream tcp wait floppy /usr/sbin/floppyd floppyd /dev/fd1
Note that you need to supply the X display names for the
second floppyd. This is because the port is opened by
inetd.conf, and hence floppyd cannot know its number to
interfere the display number.
On the client side, insert the following into your
`~/.mtoolsrc' to define a drive letter accessing floppy
drive in your X terminal:
drive x: file="$DISPLAY" remote
Mattrib
Mattrib is used to change MS-DOS file attribute flags. It
has the following syntax:
mattrib [-a|+a] [-h|+h] [-r|+r] [-s|+s] [-/] [-X] msdosfile
[ msdosfiles ... ]
Mattrib adds attribute flags to an MS-DOS file (with the `+'
operator) or remove attribute flags (with the `-' operator).
Mattrib supports the following attribute bits:
a Archive bit. Used by some backup programs to indicate
a new file.
r Read-only bit. Used to indicate a read-only file.
Files with this bit set cannot be erased by DEL nor
modified.
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s System bit. Used by MS-DOS to indicate a operating
system file.
h Hidden bit. Used to make files hidden from DIR.
Mattrib supports the following command line flags:
/ Recursive. Recursively list the attributes of the
files in the subdirectories.
X Concise. Prints the attributes whithout any whitespace
padding. This is convenient for script. If neither
the "/" option is given, nor the msdosfile contains a
wildcard, and there is only one Msdos file parameter on
the command line, only the attribute is printed, and
not the filename. This option is convenient for
scripts
Mbadblocks
The mbadblocks command is used to scan an MS-DOS floppy and
mark its unused bad blocks as bad. It uses the following
syntax:
mbadblocks drive:
Mbadblocks scans an MS-DOS floppy for bad blocks. All unused
bad blocks are marked as such in the FAT. This is intended
to be used right after mformat. It is not intended to
salvage bad disks.
Bugs
Mbadblocks should (but doesn't yet :-( ) also try to salvage
bad blocks which are in use by reading them repeatedly, and
then mark them bad.
Mcd
The mcd command is used to change the mtools working
directory on the MS-DOS disk. It uses the following syntax:
mcd [msdosdirectory]
Without arguments, mcd reports the current device and
working directory. Otherwise, mcd changes the current
device and current working directory relative to an MS-DOS
filesystem.
The environmental variable MCWD may be used to locate the
file where the device and current working directory
information is stored. The default is `$HOME/.mcwd'.
Information in this file is ignored if the file is more than
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6 hours old.
Mcd returns 0 on success or 1 on failure.
Unlike MS-DOS versions of CD, mcd can be used to change to
another device. It may be wise to remove old `.mcwd' files
at logout.
Mcopy
The mcopy command is used to copy MS-DOS files to and from
Unix. It uses the following syntax:
mcopy [-b/ptnvmoQOsSrRA] sourcefile targetfile
mcopy [-b/ptnvmoQOsSrRA] sourcefile [ sourcefiles... ] targetdirectory
mcopy [-tnvm] MSDOSsourcefile
Mcopy copies the specified file to the named file, or copies
multiple files to the named directory. The source and
target can be either MS-DOS or Unix files.
The use of a drive letter designation on the MS-DOS files,
'a:' for example, determines the direction of the transfer.
A missing drive designation implies a Unix file whose path
starts in the current directory. If a source drive letter
is specified with no attached file name (e.g. mcopy a: .),
all files are copied from that drive.
If only a single, MS-DOS source parameter is provided (e.g.
"mcopy a:foo.exe"), an implied destination of the current
directory (`.') is assumed.
A filename of `-' means standard input or standard output,
depending on its position on the command line.
Mcopy accepts the following command line options:
b Batch mode. Optimized for huge recursive copies, but
less secure if a crash happens during the copy.
/ Recursive copy. Also copies directories and their
contents
p Preserves the attributes of the copied files
Q When mcopying multiple files, quits as soon as one copy
fails (for example due to lacking storage space on the
target disk)
t Text file transfer. Mcopy translates incoming carriage
return/line feeds to line feeds.
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n No confirmation when overwriting Unix files. Mcopy
doesn't warn the user when overwriting an existing Unix
file. In order to switch off confirmation for DOS
files, use -o.
m Preserve the file modification time. If the target file
already exists, and the -n option is not in effect,
mcopy asks whether to overwrite the file or to rename
the new file (`name clashes') for details).
Bugs
Unlike MS-DOS, the '+' operator (append) from MS-DOS is not
supported. However, you may use mtype to produce the same
effect:
mtype a:file1 a:file2 a:file3 >unixfile
mtype a:file1 a:file2 a:file3 | mcopy - a:msdosfile
Mdel
The mdel command is used to delete an MS-DOS file. Its
syntax is:
mdel [-v] msdosfile [ msdosfiles ... ]
Mdel deletes files on an MS-DOS filesystem.
Mdel asks for verification prior to removing a read-only
file.
Mdeltree
The mdeltree command is used to delete an MS-DOS file. Its
syntax is:
mdeltree [-v] msdosdirectory [msdosdirectories...]
Mdeltree removes a directory and all the files and
subdirectories it contains from an MS-DOS filesystem. An
error occurs if the directory to be removed does not exist.
Mdir
The mdir command is used to display an MS-DOS directory. Its
syntax is:
mdir [-/] [-f] [-w] [-a] [-X] msdosfile [ msdosfiles...]
Mdir displays the contents of MS-DOS directories, or the
entries for some MS-DOS files.
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Mdir supports the following command line options:
/ Recursive output, just like Dos' -s option
w Wide output. With this option, mdir prints the
filenames across the page without displaying the file
size or creation date.
a Also list hidden files.
f Fast. Do not try to find out free space. On larger
disks, finding out the amount of free space takes up
some non trivial amount of time, as the whole FAT must
be read in and scanned. The -f flag bypasses this
step. This flag is not needed on FAT32 filesystems,
which store the size explicitely.
X Concise listing. List only a newline separated list of
pathnames without any decoration nor additional
information
An error occurs if a component of the path is not a
directory.
Mdu
Mdu is used to list the space occupied by a directory, its
subdirectories and its files. It is similar to the du
command on Unix. The unit used are clusters. Use the minfo
command to find out the cluster size.
mdu [-a] [ msdosfiles ... ]
a All files. List also the space occupied for individual
files.
s Only list the total space, don't give details for each
subdirectory.
Mformat
The mformat command is used to add an MS-DOS filesystem to a
low-level formatted diskette. Its syntax is:
mformat [-t cylinders] [-h heads] [-s sectors] [-l
volume_label] [-F] [-I fsVersion] [-S sizecode] [-2
sectors_on_track_0] [-M software_sector_size] [-a] [-X] [-C]
[-H hidden_sectors] [-r root_sectors] [-B boot_sector] [-0
rate_on_track_0] [-A rate_on_other_tracks] [-1] [-k] drive:
Mformat adds a minimal MS-DOS filesystem (boot sector, FAT,
and root directory) to a diskette that has already been
formatted by a Unix low-level format.
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The following options are supported: (The S, 2, 1 and M
options may not exist if this copy of mtools has been
compiled without the USE_2M option)
t The number of cylinders.
h The number of heads (sides).
s The number of sectors per track. If the 2m option is
given, number of 512-byte sector equivalents on generic
tracks (i.e. not head 0 track 0). If the 2m option is
not given, number of physical sectors per track (which
may be bigger than 512 bytes).
l An optional volume label.
S The sizecode. The size of the sector is 2 ^ (sizecode +
7).
2 2m format. The parameter to this option describes the
number of sectors on track 0, head 0. This option is
recommended for sectors bigger than normal.
1 don't use a 2m format, even if the current geometry of
the disk is a 2m geometry.
M software sector size. This parameter describes the
sector size in bytes used by the MS-DOS filesystem. By
default it is the physical sector size.
a If this option is given, an Atari style serial number
is generated. Ataris store their serial number in the
OEM label.
X formats the disk as an XDF disk. See section XDF for
more details. The disk has first to be low-level
formatted using the xdfcopy utility included in the
fdutils package.
C creates the disk image file to install the MS-DOS
filesystem on it. Obviously, this is useless on
physical devices such as floppies and hard disk
partitions.
H number of hidden sectors. This parameter is useful for
formatting hard disk partition, which are not aligned
on track boundaries (i.e. first head of first track
doesn't belong to the partition, but contains a
partition table). In that case the number of hidden
sectors is in general the number of sectors per
cylinder. This is untested.
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n serial number
F Format the partition as FAT32 (experimental).
I Sets the fsVersion id when formatting a FAT32 drive.
In order to find this out, run minfo on an existing
FAT32 drive, and mail me about it, so I can include the
correct value in future versions of mtools.
c Sets the size of a cluster (in sectors). If this
cluster size would generate a FAT that too big for its
number of bits, mtools automatically increases the
cluster size, until the FAT is small enough.
r Sets the size of the root directory (in sectors). Only
applicable to 12 and 16 bit FATs.
B Use the bootsector stored in the given file or device,
instead of using its own. Only the geometry fields are
updated to match the target disks parameters.
k Keep the existing boot sector as much as possible.
Only the geometry fields are updated to match the
target disks parameters.
0 Data transfer rate on track 0
A Data transfer rate on tracks other than 0
To format a diskette at a density other than the default,
you must supply (at least) those command line parameters
that are different from the default.
Mformat returns 0 on success or 1 on failure.
It doesn't record bad block information to the Fat, use
mkmanifest for that.
Mkmanifest
The mkmanifest command is used to create a shell script
(packing list) to restore Unix filenames. Its syntax is:
mkmanifest [ files ]
Mkmanifest creates a shell script that aids in the
restoration of Unix filenames that got clobbered by the MS-
DOS filename restrictions. MS-DOS filenames are restricted
to 8 character names, 3 character extensions, upper case
only, no device names, and no illegal characters.
The mkmanifest program is compatible with the methods used
in pcomm, arc, and mtools to change perfectly good Unix
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filenames to fit the MS-DOS restrictions. This command is
only useful if the target system which will read the
diskette cannot handle vfat long names.
Example
You want to copy the following Unix files to a MS-DOS
diskette (using the mcopy command).
very_long_name
2.many.dots
illegal:
good.c
prn.dev
Capital
Mcopy converts the names to:
very_lon
2xmany.dot
illegalx
good.c
xprn.dev
capital
The command:
mkmanifest very_long_name 2.many.dots illegal: good.c prn.dev Capital >manifest
would produce the following:
mv very_lon very_long_name
mv 2xmany.dot 2.many.dots
mv illegalx illegal:
mv xprn.dev prn.dev
mv capital Capital
Notice that "good.c" did not require any conversion, so it
did not appear in the output.
Suppose I've copied these files from the diskette to another
Unix system, and I now want the files back to their original
names. If the file "manifest" (the output captured above)
was sent along with those files, it could be used to convert
the filenames.
Bugs
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The short names generated by mkmanifest follow the old
convention (from mtools-2.0.7) and not the one from Windows
95 and mtools-3.0.
Minfo
The minfo command prints the parameters of a Dos filesystem,
such as number of sectors, heads and cylinders. It also
prints an mformat command line which can be used to create a
similar Dos filesystem on another media. However, this
doesn't work with 2m or Xdf media, and with Dos 1.0
filesystems minfo drive:
Mlabel supports the following option:
v Prints a hexdump of the bootsector, in addition to the
other information
Mlabel
The mlabel command adds a volume label to a disk. Its syntax
is: mlabel [-vcs] drive:[new_label]
Mlabel displays the current volume label, if present. If
new_label is not given, and if neither the c nor the s
options are set, it prompts the user for a new volume label.
To delete an existing volume label, press return at the
prompt.
Reasonable care is taken to create a valid MS-DOS volume
label. If an invalid label is specified, mlabel changes the
label (and displays the new label if the verbose mode is
set). Mlabel returns 0 on success or 1 on failure.
Mlabel supports the following options:
c Clears an existing label, without prompting the user
s Shows the existing label, without prompting the user.
Mmd
The mmd command is used to make an MS-DOS subdirectory. Its
syntax is:
mmd [-voOsSrRA] msdosdirectory [ msdosdirectories... ]
Mmd makes a new directory on an MS-DOS filesystem. An error
occurs if the directory already exists.
Mmount
The mmount command is used to mount an MS-DOS disk. It is
only available on Linux, as it is only useful if the OS
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kernel allows to configure the disk geometry. Its syntax is:
mmount msdosdrive [mountargs]
Mmount reads the boot sector of an MS-DOS disk, configures
the drive geometry, and finally mounts it passing mountargs
to mount. If no mount arguments are specified, the name of
the device is used. If the disk is write protected, it is
automatically mounted read only.
Mmove
The mmove command is used to moves or renames an existing
MS-DOS file or subdirectory. mmove [-voOsSrRA] sourcefile
targetfile mmove [-voOsSrRA] sourcefile [ sourcefiles... ]
targetdirectory
Mmove moves or renames an existing MS-DOS file or
subdirectory. Unlike the MS-DOS version of MOVE, mmove is
able to move subdirectories. Files or directories can only
be moved within one filesystem. Data cannot be moved from
Dos to Unix or vice-versa. If you omit the drive letter
from the target file or directory, the same letter as for
the source is assumed. If you omit the drive letter from
all parameters, drive a: is assumed by default.
Mpartition
The mpartition command is used to create MS-DOS filesystems
as partitions. This is intended to be used on non-Linux
systems, i.e. systems where fdisk and easy access to Scsi
devices are not available. This command only works on
drives whose partition variable is set.
mpartition -p drive mpartition -r drive mpartition -I drive
mpartition -a drive mpartition -d drive mpartition -c [-s
sectors] [-h heads] [-t cylinders] [-v [-T type] [-b begin]
[-l length] [-f]
Mpartition supports the following operations:
p Prints a command line to recreate the partition for the
drive. Nothing is printed if the partition for the
drive is not defined, or an inconsistency has been
detected. If verbose (-v) is also set, prints the
current partition table.
r Removes the partition described by drive.
I Initializes the partition table, and removes all
partitions.
c Creates the partition described by drive.
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a "Activates" the partition, i.e. makes it bootable.
Only one partition can be bootable at a time.
d "Desactivates" the partition, i.e. makes it unbootable.
If no operation is given, the current settings are printed.
For partition creations, the following options are
available:
s sectors
The number of sectors per track of the partition (which
is also the number of sectors per track for the whole
drive).
h heads
The number of heads of the partition (which is also the
number of heads for the whole drive). By default, the
geometry information (number of sectors and heads) is
figured out from neighbouring partition table entries,
or guessed from the size.
t cylinders
The number of cylinders of the partition (not the
number of cylinders of the whole drive.
b begin
The starting offset of the partition, expressed in
sectors. If begin is not given, mpartition lets the
partition begin at the start of the disk (partition
number 1), or immediately after the end of the previous
partition.
l length
The size (length) of the partition, expressed in
sectors. If end is not given, mpartition figures out
the size from the number of sectors, heads and
cylinders. If these are not given either, it gives the
partition the biggest possible size, considering disk
size and start of the next partition.
The following option is available for all operation which
modify the partition table:
f Usually, before writing back any changes to the
partition, mpartition performs certain consistenct
checks, such as checking for overlaps and proper
alignment of the partitions. If any of these checks
fails, the partition table is not changes. The -f
allows you to override these safeguards.
The following option is available for all operations:
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v Together with -p prints the partition table as it is
now (no change operation), or as it is after it is
modified.
vv If the verbosity flag is given twice, mpartition will
print out a hexdump of the partition table when reading
it from and writing it to the device.
Mrd
The mrd command is used to remove an MS-DOS subdirectory.
Its syntax is:
mrd [-v] msdosdirectory [ msdosdirectories... ]
Mrd removes a directory from an MS-DOS filesystem. An error
occurs if the directory does not exist or is not empty.
Mren
The mren command is used to rename or move an existing MS-
DOS file or subdirectory. Its syntax is:
mren [-voOsSrRA] sourcefile targetfile
Mren renames an existing file on an MS-DOS filesystem.
In verbose mode, Mren displays the new filename if the name
supplied is invalid.
If the first syntax is used (only one sourcefile), and if
the target name doesn't contain any slashes or colons, the
file (or subdirectory) is renamed in the same directory,
instead of being moved to the current mcd directory as would
be the case with mmove. Unlike the MS-DOS version of REN,
mren can be used to rename directories.
Mshowfat
The mshowfat command is used to display the FAT entries for
a file. Syntax:
$ mshowfat files
Mtoolstest
The mtoolstest command is used to tests the mtools
configuration files. To invoke it, just type mtoolstest
without any arguments. Mtoolstest reads the mtools
configuration files, and prints the cumulative configuration
to stdout. The output can be used as a configuration file
itself (although you might want to remove redundant
clauses). You may use this program to convert old-style
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configuration files into new style configuration files.
Mtype
The mtype command is used to display contents of an MS-DOS
file. Its syntax is:
mtype [-ts] msdosfile [ msdosfiles... ]
Mtype displays the specified MS-DOS file on the screen.
In addition to the standard options, Mtype allows the
following command line options:
t Text file viewing. Mtype translates incoming carriage
return/line feeds to line feeds.
s Mtype strips the high bit from the data.
The mcd command may be used to establish the device and the
current working directory (relative to MS-DOS), otherwise
the default is A:/.
Mtype returns 0 on success, 1 on utter failure, or 2 on
partial failure.
Unlike the MS-DOS version of TYPE, mtype allows multiple
arguments.
Mzip
The mzip command is used to issue ZIP disk specific commands
on Solaris or HPUX. Its syntax is:
mzip [-epqrwx]
Mzip allows the following command line options:
e Ejects the disk.
f Force eject even if the disk is mounted (must be given
in addition to -e).
r Write protect the disk.
w Remove write protection.
p Password write protect.
x Password protect
u Temporarily unprotect the disk until it is ejected.
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The disk becomes writable, and reverts back to its old
state when ejected.
q Queries the status
To remove the password, set it to one of the passwordless
modes -r or -w: mzip will then ask you for the password, and
unlock the disk. If you have forgotten the password, you
can get rid of it by low-level formatting the disk (using
your SCSI adaptor's BIOS setup).
The ZipTools disk shipped with the drive is also password
protected. On Dos or on a Mac, this password is
automatically removed once the ZipTools have been installed.
From various articles posted to Usenet, I learned that the
password for the tools disk is APlaceForYourStuff. Mzip
knows about this password, and tries it first, before
prompting you for a password. Thus mzip -w z: unlocks the
tools disk. The tools disk is formatted in a special way so
as to be usable both in a PC and in a Mac. On a PC, the Mac
filesystem appears as a hidden file named `partishn.mac'.
You may erase it to reclaim the 50 Megs of space taken up by
the Mac filesystem.
Xcopy
The xcopy script is used to recursively copy one directory
to another. Its syntax is:
xcopy sourcedirectory targetdirectory
If targetdirectory does not exist, it is created. If it
does exist, the files of sourcedirectory are directly copied
into it, and no subdirectory called sourcedirectory is
created, unlike with cp -rf.
Bugs
This command is a big kludge. A proper implementation would
take a rework of significant parts of mtools, but
unfortunately I don't have the time for this right now. The
main downside of this implementation is that it is
inefficient on some architectures (several successive calls
to mtools, which defeats mtools' caching).
Architecture specific compilation flags
To compile mtools, first invoke ./configure before make. In
addition to the standard autoconfigure flags, there are two
architecture specific flags available.
./configure --enable-xdf
./configure --disable-xdf
Enables support for XDF disks. This is on by default.
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See section XDF, for details.
./configure --enable-vold
./configure --disable-vold
Enables support for vold on Solaris. When used in
conjunction with vold, mtools should uses different
device nodes as for direct access.
./configure --enable-new-vold
./configure --disable-new-vold
Enables new support for vold on Solaris. This is
supposed to work more smoothly than the old support.
./configure --enable-floppyd
./configure --disable-floppyd
Enables support for floppyd. By default, floppyd
support is enabled as long as the necessary X includes
and libraries are available.
Porting mtools to architectures which are not supported yet
This chapter is only interesting for those who want to port
mtools to an architecture which is not yet supported. For
most common systems, default drives are already defined. If
you want to add default drives for a still unsupported
system, run config.guess, to see which identification
autoconf uses for that system. This identification is of the
form cpu-vendor-os (for example sparc-sun-sunos). The cpu
and the os parts are passed to the compiler as preprocessor
flags.
The OS part is passed to the compiler in three forms.
1. The complete os name, with dots replaced by
underscores. sco3.2v2 would yield sco3_2v2
2. The base os name. Sco3.2v2 would yield Sco
3. The base os name plus its major version. Sco3.2v2 would
yield Sco3
All three versions are passed, if they are different.
To define the devices, use the entries for the systems that
are already present as templates. In general, they have the
following form:
#if (defined (my_cpu) && defined(my_os))
#define predefined_devices
struct device devices[] = {
{ "/dev/first_drive", 'drive_letter', drive_description},
...
{ "/dev/last_drive", 'drive_letter', drive_description}
}
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#define INIT_NOOP
#endif
"/dev/first_drive" is the name of the device or image file
representing the drive. Drive_letter is a letter ranging
from a to z giving access to the drive. Drive_description
describes the type of the drive:
ED312
extra density (2.88M) 3 1/2 disk
HD312
high density 3 1/2 disk
DD312
double density 3 1/2 disk
HD514
high density 5 1/4 disk
DD514
double density 5 1/4 disk
DDsmall
8 sector double density 5 1/4 disk
SS514
single sided double density 5 1/4 disk
SSsmall
single sided 8 sector double density 5 1/4 disk
GENFD
generic floppy drive (12 bit FAT)
GENHD
generic hard disk (16 bit FAT)
GEN generic device (all parameters match)
ZIPJAZ(flags)
generic ZIP drive using normal access. This uses
partition 4. Flags are any special flags to be passed
to open.
RZIPJAZ(flags)
generic ZIP drive using raw SCSI access. This uses
partition 4. Flags are any special flags to be passed
to open.
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REMOTE
the remote drive used for floppyd. Unlike the other
items, this macro also includes the file name
($DISPLAY) and the drive letter (X)
Entries may be described in more detail:
fat_bits,open_flags,cylinders,heads,sectors,DEF_ARG
or, if you need to describe an offset (filesystem doesn't
start at beginning of filesystem)
fat_bits, open_flags, cylinders, heads, sectors, offset, DEF_ARG0
fat_bits
is either 12, 16 or 0. 0 means that the device accepts
both types of FAT.
open_flags
may include flags such as O_NDELAY, or O_RDONLY, which
might be necessary to open the device. 0 means no
special flags are needed.
cylinders,heads,sectors
describe the geometry of the disk. If cylinders is 0,
the heads and sectors parameters are ignored, and the
drive accepts any geometry.
offset
is used if the DOS filesystem doesn't begin at the
start of the device or image file. This is mostly
useful for Atari Ram disks (which contain their device
driver at the beginning of the file) or for DOS
emulator images (which may represent a partitioned
device.
Definition of defaults in the devices file should only be
done if these same devices are found on a large number of
hosts of this type. In that case, could you also let me know
about your new definitions, so that I can include them into
the next release. For purely local file, I recommend that
you use the /usr/freeware/etc/mtools.conf and ~/.mtoolsrc
configuration files.
However, the devices files also allows to supply geometry
setting routines. These are necessary if you want to access
high capacity disks.
Two routines should be supplied:
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1. Reading the current parameters
static inline int get_parameters(int fd, struct generic_floppy_struct *floppy)
This probes the current configured geometry, and
return it in the structure generic_floppy_struct (which
must also be declared).
Fd is an open file descriptor for the device, and buf
is an already filled in stat structure, which may be
useful.
This routine should return 1 if the probing fails, and
0 otherwise.
2. Setting new parameters
static inline int set_parameters(int fd, struct generic_floppy_struct *floppy)
struct stat *buf)
This configures the geometry contained in floppy on
the file descriptor fd. Buf is the result of a stat
call (already filled in). This should return 1 if the
new geometry cannot be configured, and 0 otherwise.
A certain number of preprocessor macros should also be
supplied:
TRACKS(floppy)
refers to the track field in the floppy structure
HEADS(floppy)
refers to the heads field in the floppy structure
SECTORS(floppy)
refers to the sectors per track field in the floppy
structure
SECTORS_PER_DISK(floppy)
refers to the sectors per disk field in the floppy
structure (if applicable, otherwise leave undefined)
BLOCK_MAJOR
major number of the floppy device, when viewed as a
block device
CHAR_MAJOR
major number of the floppy device, when viewed as a
character device (a.k.a. "raw" device, used for fsck)
(leave this undefined, if your OS doesn't have raw
devices)
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For the truly high capacity formats (XDF, 2m, etc), there
is no clean and documented interface yet.
See also
mattrib mbadblocks mcd mcopy mdel mdeltree mdir mdu mformat
mkmanifest mlabel mmd mmount mmove mrd mread mren mtoolstest
mtype
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