Apple ][e software?

From: Sam Ismail <dastar_at_crl.com>
Date: Thu Jun 19 14:37:34 1997

On Thu, 19 Jun 1997, Andy Brobston wrote:

> I managed to get DOS 3.3 by finding a game or something that ran on
> DOS 3.3, halting it with Control-C to get to the Applesoft BASIC
> prompt, then using the file commands such as INIT to make a new disk.
> I can't remember if DOS 3.3 has a built-in command that will copy a
> disk... There's probably a way to do it.

No, there wasn't a disk copy command, but if you knew machine language and
the RWTS (Read/Write Track Subroutines) of DOS 3.3 you could hack one up
in a few minutes. Otherwise, the easier and saner way was to just pop in
a disk with a disk copy program and BRUN it.

DOS 3.3 was very cool, because it was so accesible and so easy to hack. I
used to make my own extensions for it, adding subdirectories and other
features to DOS 3.3 that only ProDOS had. ProDOS I thought was lame,
because it required more work to do stuff with. It ate up more disk and
memory resources, its boot process was longer, and its directory
heirarhcy sucked because you could move back a directory without having
to type in the full path. (IE. going from /disk/dir1/dir2/dir3 to
/disk/dir1/dir2 required you to type PREFIX /disk/dir1/dir2...it got
annoying with real deep directories). But it was a definite improvement
over DOS as far as interfacing to it from machine language.

Sam
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Computer Historian, Programmer, Musician, Philosopher, Athlete, Writer, Jackass
Received on Thu Jun 19 1997 - 14:37:34 BST