*BSD News Article 71079


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From: j@uriah.heep.sax.de (J Wunsch)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd.freebsd.misc
Subject: Re: Floppy tape device?
Date: 15 Jun 1996 16:15:06 GMT
Organization: Private BSD site, Dresden
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keng@hybrid.com (Ken Gaugler) wrote:

(revamping the `ft' driver)

> Sadly, I lack the necessary C programming experience under unix to do
> this job myself.  I am only interested in the floppy tape device for
> my personal system at home; therefore it is not possible for me to
> justify paying for a fully operational floppy tape driver.

The problem is not the requirement of overwhelming C knowledge.  The
biggest problem is to redesign the ft driver into a clear structure
(and most likely, to also redesign the fdc driver).  Given the
terrible command handling of QIC-80 drives, this is quickly going
beyond the ``fun point'' for most people.  It's therefore much better
for them to spend a few bucks into a QIC-02 card and drive (for
example), and hack something really useful instead of wasting several
hundred hours just to build a driver that can handled inferior (by
design) hardware.

-- 
cheers, J"org

joerg_wunsch@uriah.heep.sax.de -- http://www.sax.de/~joerg/ -- NIC: JW11-RIPE
Never trust an operating system you don't have sources for. ;-)