A file copier will copy the contents of a disk in a file by file manner. You may select which files to copy or not to copy, and files already present on the copy disk won't be disturbed. Copying files to a new disk may also straighten them out, making them reload faster. Furthermore it is possible to adjust the sector interleave (using the Interleave Set command) which may further increase the speed. The file copier will work with all disk drives that can be hooked up to the 128, including RAMDOS. The file copier can copy files without restrictions between dissimilar drive types.
The file copier can copy program (PRG) files, sequential (SEQ) files and user (USR) files. It can not cope with relative (REL) files. Please note that the file copier can not handle GEOS files (which are marked in the directory as USR) because of their non-standard structure.
The file copier will automatically detect if your computer is equipped with 64K VDC (80 column) RAM, and utilize it to reduce the number of passes. Will also take advantage of a Ram Expansion Unit of any size if turned on at the Disk Tools menu.
SPECIAL NOTE to 1571 users: The original 1571 disk drive and the drive inside the first 128D model (the so-called 128D portable), but not the ones inside the newer 128D, has some quirks which may affect the performance of the file copier. Please refer to Appendix D for further details.
SPECIAL NOTE to 1581 users: The file copier will fully support subdirectories. If you're using two disk drives (regardless if one or both are 1581s) the 1581(s) will access the subdirectory (or subdirectories) currently selected. However, if the main and copy disk drive is one and the same, you must enter the directory paths individually. The cursor will appear, and you may enter the subdirectory name. To use the root directory, press RETURN at a blank line (do NOT enter "/" in order to select the root directory) Use cursor left/right, INST, DEL, CLR and HOME to edit if necessary. You can access several levels of subdirectories by separating the directory names using commas (directory1,directory2,directory3). You must enter the whole directory path from the root on (but DON'T specify the root itself, this is done automatically). If the drive can't find one of the subdirectories you have entered, you will be informed about the error and prompted to correct the directory specification. To copy files from one subdirectory to another on the same disk, leave the same disk in the drive when you are prompted for the target disk.
When the file copier is selected, you will be prompted for the source disk (or both source and target disk if you're using two drives) and an options menu will appear. The options are as follows:
Auto replace:
The file copier will automatically replace any files on the copy disk with the same names as the ones being copied to it.
Multi output:
Will let you make several copies of the files. After every pass you will be asked if you want to make another copy of the files. Insert a new disk and press Y for YES. If you don't want any more copies, press N for NO, and another read pass will begin if there's more files to be copied.
Delete source:
This option will let you scratch the copied files from the source disk. Using this feature, the files are effectively MOVED to the copy disk. The scratch operation will be done using an extra pass after finishing the actual copying. Only the files which were successfully copied will be deleted.
Press the space bar to continue. The directory of the source disk will now be read into the computer's memory. If there are no files on the disk that the file copier can copy, the message "No valid files" will appear, and the file copier will be aborted.
PLEASE NOTE: The disk copier can only copy SEQ (SEQuential), PRG (PRoGram) and USR (USeR) files (but NOT GEOS files), and only those types will appear on the disk directory. There may well be other file types on the disk, but they won't be displayed on the disk copier's directory.
Move the flashing cursor up and down using the cursor keys, press + and - keys to move one page up and down respectively, and HOME to go to the top of the directory. Pressing the HOME key will place the cursor on the first directory entry.
Select the files you want to copy using SPACE (cursor don't move), RETURN (cursor moves down) or SHIFT/RETURN (cursor moves up). Pressing any of those keys on a file which has already be selected will undo the selection of that file. All files can be selected at once by pressing 'A', or all files can be de-selected by pressing CLR.
To start copying, press F1. The file copier will start loading the files into memory. If you haven't selected any files, the message "No valid files" will appear, and the file copier is aborted.
Errors may occur during the reading. If a file can't be read, the file copier will inform you about the problem and ask you if you want to retry reading the file. You may want to remove the disk and then re-insert it as this may align the disk more correctly and the disk drive might just be able to read the file. If you don't want to retry the file, that file will be skipped. If a file is to large to fit into the computer's memory altogether, the message "File too large" will appear, and the file will have to be skipped. By the way, the file copier can handle files as large as the available memory, roughly 480 blocks on a old flat 128, 713 blocks on a 128D (or 128 with 64K VDC memory), or 2776 if you add a 512K REU.
When the computer memory is filled up (or there's no more files to be read) the computer will prompt you for the target disk. If you're using two drives however, the copy process will continue without delay.
Again, errors when saving files to the target disk may occur. The file copier will monitor how much space there's left on the disk, and inform you if the space is insufficient. If a file can't be written properly, the file copier will inform you about the problem and ask you if you want to retry writing the file. You may then elect to skip the file, try again, or insert a new target disk to continue. If the file exists, you will be asked if you want to replace the file. The existing file is erased, and the new file (the one being copied from the source disk) will then be written.
PLEASE NOTE: Despite THE SERVANTs safeguard system, there are two reasons why you might encounter the error message "disk full". Some disk drives has a quirk which throws up this error if you try to save a new file when the number of blocks free are 3 or less. The error message will also appear if you exceed the maximum number of files allowed on the disk. Unfortunately, odd things sometimes happens to the disk in these cases, especially in the latter case. To be safe it is probably best to validate the disk if you encounter the "disk full" error message with the file copier. So far, I haven't been able to circumvent those problems.
The file copier will make every effort to avoid error conditions on the copy disk. It will even validate the disk if found to be necessary to recover safely from an error.
If there are more files to be copied than would fit in the computer's available memory, you will be prompted for the source disk (unless you're using two drives) and another pass will be performed for as many times over as necessary to copy all the files.
