HPFSRem -- HPFS removability software Documentation

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             HPFSRem -- HPFS removability software
                         Version 1.11
                Documentation update (96/10/13)
             Copyright (c) 1996 by Jeff Jackowski

This software is free

Introduction

   HPFSRem allows you to use HPFS on some removable drives
   without losing the ability to remove and replace disks.
   Although HPFS without any special software can sometimes be
   used on a removable drive without any problems, I found that
   often system crashes will be the result and data can be
   lost. HPFSRem is my attempt to eliminate data loss and
   system crashes from using HPFS formatted removable media.  I
   can't guarantee HPFSRem will let you use HPFS with any
   drive, but it works for me and several other people with
   varying drives. You should test your drive with HPFSRem to
   see if it works before using HPFS on removable disks on a
   large scale. Please email me at jackowskij@email.uah.edu to
   tell me what works and what doesn't. Also, visit the web sit
   at http://www.cs.uah.edu/cs/students/jjackows/hpfsrem. If its
   not there, search for it on Yahoo.
   
   And PLEASE be sure to send the output of HPFSRem with the
   "S" parameter and any error codes if you're having a
   problem.
   PLEASE READ THIS DOCUMENT CAREFULLY! HPFS was not made to
   support removable drives. HPFSRem attempts to circumvent
   this limitation and will work if my directions are followed
   and your removable drive cooperates. Any deviation from my
   instructions may cause various problems ranging from an
   inability to use HPFS on removable media to system crashes
   when a disk formatted with HPFS is removed or inserted.
   Also, any emails I get with questions that have answers in
   this text may not receive a response.
   NOTE TO EXPERTS: You may skip the "Disk setup" section, but
   should read the rest, paying close attention to the "FYI"
   and "Known problems and limitations" sections.

System Requirements

   OS/2 Warp (version 2.x may work, but I'm not sure)
   HPFS must be installed
   EMX 0.9a or later installed
   A removable drive (see "Compatible Drives" and "Drive
     Requirements" sections below)
   NOTE: Contrary to SyQuest documentation, partitioned
     removable disks can be used if OS/2 boots from a logical
     partition (so you can put OS/2 on drive D and DOS on drive
     C, for instance). The removable disks should be given a
     logical, not primary, partition to make this work.

Web Site

   http://www.cincyteamos2.org/hpfsrem/
   Listed on Yahoo
   The site contains updated information on HPFSRem including:
      A list of compatible drives
      Instructions on making the drives work
      Links to device drivers
      The latest version of HPFSRem
   The web site is meant to be an addendum to this document,
     not a total replacement.

Compatible Drives

   The following drives have been tested by myself and other
     users. Other drives may work as well.
   Iomega Zip works with the OAD drivers and works. FLT drivers
     may also work. Follow the instructions included with the
     drivers to format the disks with HPFS, then use HPFSRem.
   Iomega Jaz has not been made to work, possibly because of
     SCSI controller problems.
   SCSI controller note: The Iomega drivers use a neat trick to
     allow the disks to be formatted with HPFS. Controllers
     other than the ones that Iomega sells may have to use
     different drivers, which means no HPFS.
   SyQuest's EZ135 and SQ3270 have been tested and work.
   SyQuest's EZFlyer and SyJET probably work because they use
     the same drivers as the EZ135.
   A PD drive manufactured by Matsushita Electronic for
     Panasonic and Toray (650MB PHASEWRITER DUAL). It may
     require SyQuest drivers to eject, along with its own
     drivers.

Drive Requirements

   SHORT: The drive should be non-removable (from OS/2's point
   of view) or removable and lockable. Plus, you'll need to
   format the disk with HPFS.
   LONG: To use HPFS with a given drive, you need to able able
   to format the disk with HPFS (consult documentation below
   and the documentation that came with the drive). This
   sometimes requires that you lock the disk in the drive. Use
   HPFSRem with the "I" parameter to lock the disk. Some drives
   will lock automatically. If the drive won't unlock, then the
   drive won't let you remove the disk.

Error messages (New info for v1.1)

   HPFSRem v1 would sometimes give error messages that did not
   stop it from doing its task. I think it mostly has to do
   with support for locking and unlocking the disk, which was
   required in v1 to run without errors. I have made v1.1 to
   better handle the lack of support for locking and unlocking,
   and to support removable drives that OS/2 sees as
   non-removable drives.
   In addition, HPFSRem v1.1 gives error code values that,
   while not always self-explanatory, should help me to figure
   out what's wrong.

Installation

   First, install EMX if you haven't already. You can find the
     file you need at ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu or ftp://cdrom.com.
     The directory to look for is EMX???, where the ??? mark
     the version number, such as 09a and 09b. The file is
     EMXRT.ZIP. It contains installation instructions for
     itself.
   Copy HPFSRem.exe to a directory in your path.

Instructions

   The syntax of HPFSRem is:
      HPFSRem d [R | I | RI | S]
   d is the drive letter of the removable drive.
   R tells HPFSRem to prepare the disk for removal. If the disk
     is locked (drive won't allow the disk to be ejected), then
     HPFSRem will unlock it.
   I tells HPFSRem to allow the insertion of a disk. You will
     be prompted to insert a disk. The disk will be locked in
     the drive until the "R" parameter is given.
   RI, a combination of the separate "R" and "I" parameters,
     tells HPFSRem to prepare a disk for removal and then allow
     another disk to be inserted.
   S will make HPFSRem give you information about the drive you
     specify. This information includes whether OS/2 sees the
     drive a removable or not, if the drive is locked, can be
     locked, or won't tell, and HPFSRem's assessment of the
     possibility of using HPFS removability on the drive.
     PLEASE give me this information along with bug reports!
   Type "hpfsrem" and enter to receive a help screen.

Disk setup

   NOTE: The following procedure only works for removable
   drives that support partitions, like SyQuest drives.
   Although the below text says otherwise (I haven't revised
   it), HPFSRem can be used on drives that do not support
   partitions so long as its disks can be formatted with HPFS.
   Follow the instructions included with your drive to do this.
   Then you can use HPFSRem.
   To make use of this utility, you must format some of your
   removable disks with HPFS. To do this, you must first
   partition your disk using FDISK. You can run FDISK from the
   command line, or select "Create partition" from the menu of
   the Drives object.
   If you are preparing several disks, it is fastest to boot
   the system to the command line by pressing Alt-F1 before the
   OS/2 logo is displayed and then pressing "C" for the command
   line. This is because you will have to reboot every time you
   set up a partition. HPFSRem can be used to unlock the disk
   so that you can remove it without having to boot to the WPS.
   Once you're running FDISK, select the correct disk for your
   removable drive. FDISK starts with disk 1 (first physical
   disk) selected. Disk 1 is normally a hard drive -- you will
   probably need to select disk 2 or higher. If you can't find
   the removable drive on FDISK's drive list, then you can't
   use HPFSRem :(.
   Next, delete any existing partitions on the removable disk.
   Of course, you should backup any data that may be on the
   disk if you want to keep it. After that, create a partition
   on your removable disk that is the full size of the disk.
   The default partition size FDISK will present is the total
   remaning space on the disk. Make the partition an
   extended/logical partition. Then quit FDISK. A reboot is
   required by the system at this point.
   After rebooting, you will need to format the disk. Go to the
   menu of the removable drive in the Drives folder and select
   format. Tell the format program to use HPFS. Or, you can use
   the format command from the command line with the "/fs:hpfs"
   parameter.

FYI

   HPFSRem only needs to be used when a disk being removed or
     inserted has been formatted with HPFS. When only disks
     formatted with FAT are involved, the methods supplied with
     your removable drive may be used.
   Before you shutdown the system, you may need either an HPFS
     disk in your removable drive or have used a FAT disk in
     the drive last. The FAT disk needs to be used in some way
     (typing "dir" at the command line is good enough) and may
     be removed before shutdown. Failure to meet these
     conditions may prevent a proper shutdown of the system if
     you booted the system with a FAT disk in the removable
     drive. Booting with an HPFS disk seems to prevent this
     problem.
   It is best to partition removable disks with a logical, not
     primary, partition weather or not HPFS will be used on the
     disk. If OS/2 is booted from a logical partition, then
     attempting to use a removable disk with a primary
     partition will cause the system to crash. Partitioning the
     disks with a logical partition avoids this problem and
     works fine with systems that boot OS/2 from a primary
     partition. If you use a SyQuest drive, the DOS/Windows
     drivers will have no trouble using logical partitions.
   Before a disk can be removed, all programs must stop using
     files on the disk. If a program has a file open on the
     removable disk, HPFSRem will give an error and will not
     unlock the disk. Also, it is a good idea to close all
     views of the files and directories on the disk before
     removing it.
   OS/2 uses a feature called lazywrite that buffers data to be
     written to a disk to improve performance. HPFSRem always
     makes certain that all data to be written to the removable
     disk is written before removal.

Known problems and limitations

   If you copy files with long names to a removable HPFS disk
     using the WPS (drag & drop), the result may be
     interesting. Although folder views of the directory on the
     HPFS removable will have long names, the files on the
     removable disk may not have long names. If you type "dir"
     at a command prompt, and find that the long names of the
     files are not in the directory, then you have this
     problem.
     One way around this problem seems to be to put an HPFS
     formatted disk in the removeable drive before booting
     OS/2. Then, all files copied to the disk from the WPS will
     retain their long names.
     Another work around is to use the command line. A copy
     command issued from the WPS will convert the long names of
     files to names suitable for FAT volume. However, if you
     copy files from the command line, the long names will be
     preserved. Note that from the command line you cannot copy
     a file with a long name to a FAT volume.
   This program does not allow the use of HPFS on floppies.
     This is because HPFS can only be put on partitioned disks.
     Floppies cannot be partitioned. This is a limitation of
     OS/2, but so is not supporting HPFS on removable disks
     :-).
   HPFSRem supports only a single partition on removable disks.
     Multiple partitions on a removable disk will cause
     problems.
   Occasionally, the system may not complete a shutdown
     properly. This sometimes seems to be in connection with a
     drive not ready error from the removable drive. The cause
     of the error is trying to read from the drive when no disk
     is in it. Avoid this error. Also, limiting yourself to
     using the "RI" parameter for HPFSRem and using HPFSRem
     when any disk is being inserted or removed, not just HPFS
     disks, may help solve the problem.
   If data loss occurs when removing FAT disks from the drive,
     use HPFSRem to remove FAT disks as well as HPFS disks. The
     data loss may come from using lazywrites on the disk. The
     lazywrite feature will cache writes to the disk, so some
     data to be written may be held in buffers when a disk is
     removed. HPFSRem will make OS/2 write the contents of the
     buffers to the disk, so no data loss will occur from
     caching writes to the disk.

Labels

   To help me keep track of what I put on my removable disks, I
   made a simple disk label template for use with IBM Works.
   The label, included in this package, is made for EZ135
   disks, but could be altered for use with other disks.
   To make use of the label, load it with IBM Works and save it
   with a different name. You can change the "Spine
   Description" by double clicking your mouse on it. You'll be
   presented with a dialog where you you can change the text
   and its orientation. Be sure that the bottom right icon on
   this dialog is pressed or the text won't be vertical
   anymore.
   There are two tables on the left and right sides of the
   label. You can type text into these tables. If you press tab
   at the end of the table, you'll get another row and a
   horizontal line to go with it. This can't be undone without
   deleting and remaking the table. Its not my fault --
   IBMWorks needs some work.
   You can also add a vertical line to the table to separate
   some of the rows into columns. The vertical line doesn't
   have to divide all the rows. Also, it seems that only one
   vertical line can be used. If you add a third, no text will
   be displayed to the right of the line.
   Before you print the label, you may have to go to the
   printer setup dialog and tell your printer to print
   landscape style. I don't know why this is necessary, as IBM
   Works has been told to use landscape style for the label. It
   might be because I'm using OMNI.DRV to run my printer.
   Next, tell IBM Works to print only the first page, or you'll
   get an empty page at the end.
   Finally, cut along the outer lines and put the printed label
   in place of the blue label shipped with disk.

Future posiblities

   Documentation in HTML (anyone got space on a web server I
     could use for this?)
   An install program that adds a menu option to the object of
     the removeable drive for HPFSRem (way in the futrue)

Registration

   HPFSRem may be employed for personal use at no charge.
   For commercial use, HPFSRem may be used for a 30 day trial
   period. For continued use beyond the 30 day trial period, it
   must be registered.
   To register, send a check for $20 (in US currency, or
   discuss other possibilities with me) made out to Jeffrey
   Jackowski and address the envelope to:
         608J South Loop Road
         Huntsville, AL 35805
   Send your email address so that I can send you your
   registered copy via email. Or, send a floppy with your check
   and I'll return it with the registered software. (But
   remeber, I don't know how to send mail internationally.)

About the programmer

   I, Jeff Jackowski, am a student at the University of Alabama
   in Huntsville. Not long after I bought my computer at the
   beginning of 1995, I have been running OS/2 Warp on it. I
   decided to run OS/2 after reading good things about it in
   some periodicals starting a year or two before I bought it.
   Too bad its harder to find such good words about OS/2 in the
   general press now.
   I can be reached at jackowskij@@email.uah.edu, but since I
   am sometimes busy with classes, it may take me a while to
   respond.

Copyright

   HPFSRem -- Copyright 1996 by Jeffrey Jackowski

License

   HPFSRem now uses the GNU General Public License.
   It should be included in the same archive as HPFSRem with
    the name "COPYING". It may not be changed.