Date   : Fri, 31 Jan 1997 05:37:14 +0000
From   : Mike Tomlinson <mike@...>
Subject: Disk image formats?

I've been experimenting with Tom Seddon's BBC emulator, and have been
able to transfer disks from the BBC by reading them with FDC and
Anadisk, then converting them.

What's confusing me is the range of formats used by emulators.  We seem
to have Wouter's image format and Tom's DFFS format, among others.

Are there any moves to standardise on a particular image file format for
different emulators?  I remember a discussion here recently about how
best to preserve boot and file information, but formed the impression
that was just to make it easier to transfer files back to the Beeb.

The reason I ask is that I have about 1000 DFS discs with various games,
roms, utilities, educational programs etc. on which I would be glad to
put up on my web site, if I had any idea which format would be most
useful.

I was thinking of using FDC or Anadisk to read the discs and then
converting them to DFFS format, then zipping them using -eX (extra
compression) before putting them up.

Comments here or by email welcome.


-- 
Mike Tomlinson
Alexander Graham Bell's worst nightmare: "This is Watson, I'm
sorry I can't come right now, please leave a message."