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Sys7 Emergency Disk.txt
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1992-08-28
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From: rrr@duck.svl.cdc.com (Rich Ragan)
Subject: Building a Sys7 Emergency Disk
Date: Mon, 10 Feb 92 14:12:54 PST
The following description should probably go into the archives
rather than just be a one time posting.
Thanks, Rich Ragan (rrr@svl.cdc.com)
=====================================================
Everyone should have a "In Case of Emergency, Break Glass System
Floppy Disk". It should contain a bootable system and a good disk
recovery utility such as Norton, SUM, etc. However, with the advent
of System 7 this has become hard. A minimal System and Finder leaves
insufficient space for the disk recovery tools.
The following cookbook will allow you to build an emergency recovery
disk for your Macintosh. Here is how to proceed.
First you want to be careful not to mess up your own system. The
installer will not let you install on the disk with the currently
running system. Most users have only one floppy drive and only
one hard disk. Therefore, if you install floppy to floppy you will
enter what is often called "toaster mode" where Mac floppies pop
like toast from the drive in a seemingly interminable sequence.
Therefore, a "better" way is to install floppy to hard drive. But
this can easily end up replacing your current System 7 version with
a minimal one -- something you probably don't want to do. Therefore,
the following procedure let's you avoid this. If you are uncomfortable
with this or have two 1.4MB floppy drives, try the alternative
procedure at the end.
1) Reboot your system from the installer floppy.
2) Open the System folder on your hard drive (not the floppy) and
drag the Finder into a folder (Extensions will do). Now rename
your Hard Drive System Folder to another name (say My System Folder).
The MAC determines which is the system folder by finding one that
contains both a System file and a Finder. By splitting them up
you make your System Folder back into an ordinary folder. You want
to rename it because the Installer will create a new folder named
System Folder.
3) Double click the installer on the floppy. Follow the normal
System 7 install procedure. Select installation on the hard disk
where you just renamed your System Folder. Next, click the
Custom Install button and scroll down the list of things you can
install until you find "Min System for your-machine-kind". Select
this and click Install (not Easy Install).
4) When the install completes you will have a new System Folder on
your hard drive with a mimimum system in it. This amounts to a
System file, a Finder and a couple of folders.
5) You should be able to reboot your machine and have it start up
successfully from this minimal system. If, for some reason, it
will not restart your emergency recourse is to reboot from the
installer floppy and go to step 7) below to restore your previous
System. This should not be necessary, however.
6) After the reboot, take a freshly erased 1.4MB floppy and copy just
the minimal System file you have built on the hard drive to the
floppy. Do not copy the Finder or any of the folders. The file
named System should now be the only thing on your floppy.
7) Now you are ready to restore your previous system, having generated
a minimal system. Open the minimal System Folder, drag the Finder
into the Control Panel folder. This will split the
System and Finder and as described above make this a non-System Folder.
Rename your mini System Folder to something like MinSysFolder. Now
rename your previous System Folder back to what it was (probably
System Folder). Open it and move the Finder from the Extensions
Folder back into the System Folder. Now close the System
Folder. You should see the special icon denoting the System Folder
appear on it. If it does, all is well. The System now accepts it
as THE System Folder. If it does not appear, open and close the
System Folder once more. Sometimes this will do the trick. If not,
try dragging the Finder from the System Folder to the Desktop. Now
close the System Folder and drag it back into the System Folder.
This has sometimes been necessary to force recognition. Once you
get a System Folder icon you are ready to reboot using your original
full System 7 environment.
8) Now you are ready to put the Minimal System file on the floppy onto
a "quick weight loss diet". You will need ResEdit to do this. Start
up ResEdit and delete the following resources types/numbers from
the Minimal System file. If you don't know how to use ResEdit, find
someone who does (i.e., kids don't try this without adult supervision).
The essence of the shrinking procedure is that there is a lot of good
stuff in the System that is not needed when more pressing things are
going on (like recovering a crashed hard disk). Therefore, you will
delete these nice but superfluous parts of the Minimal System file.
The following list of resource type and numbers appear to be safely
deletable for a minimum system. Don't try to construct a system you
run everyday this way. For example, transcendantal functions are
deleted (hopefully no disk recovery packages needed to compute sines).
Ranges of resources to delete are separated by a colon.
Major space gains come from deleting the AppleTalk DRVR's and the
packages (PACK 5, and 9-15). For example, PACK 14 is the Balloon
Help stuff. Each PACK owns other resources which can be removed
after the PACK is gone. The owner of a resource can be seen by
selecting the resource and doing a get resource info. Thus if you
have deleted PACK 14 you can safely delete all resources it owns
(like hdlg, hmnu, DITL, DLOG, etc.). Of course you must not try to
use balloon help after that. Rather than make you think about it
here is a list of things you can delete to build a minimum system.
You may not have all the things that are in the list depending on
which machine you built the minimum system for.
ALRT -16407:-16406 -5758
DITL & -32512:-32509 -16492:-16491 -16483: -16482
DLOG -16409 -16407:-16406 -5856
-5792:-5786 -5760 -5758
-5696
DRVR .DSP .MPP .XPP .ATP
FKEY all
hdlg all
hmnu all
icl4 all
ics# all but 16386 (Apple Icon)
ics4 all
ICON -16492:-16487
ics8 all
PACK 9:15 and 5 (if present)
PICT -16482:-16485 -5790 -5789 -5760
-5696:-5694
STR -16410:-16409 -5786
STR# -16985 -16491 -16484:-16482 -16413
-16411 -16409:-16408 -6079 -6045
-5856 -5792:--5787 -5759 -5696
-4096
9) After quitting from Resedit and saving the changes you
should have a floppy with a lot of space on it. Now put
your Disk Recovery utility on this disk as well. Rename
the Disk Recovery Utility to have the name Finder. It will
now be run immediately when you boot from this floppy since
it is thought to be the normal Finder.
Alternative procedure for floppy only building.
1) Boot using installer floppy. Eject installer floppy
by dragging to trash. Insert freshly erased 1.4MB
floppy. Now eject it using Eject menu item. Reinsert
installer floppy and run the installer.
2) Select installation on the empty 1.4MB floppy disk
Next, click the Custom Install button and scroll down the
list of things you can install until you find
"Min System for your-machine-kind". Select
this and click Install (not Easy Install). Follow the
disk swap instructions.
4) When the install completes you will have a new System Folder on
your floppy disk with a mimimum system in it. This amounts to a
System file, a Finder and a couple of folders.
5) Drag the Finder and all folders in the System Folder on the
Minimum System floppy to the Trash.Leaving only the file named
System.
6) Now use Resedit on the System file on the minimum system floppy
as described in step 8 above. Finally do step 9.