ArcLink5


ArcLink5

On January 2nd, Paul Vigay released a beta of his RISC OS file transfer software for the S5 and Geofox One (although it should eventually work for the S3c and possibly the Siena as well). It's now got to v0·08, and is significantly better than the initial version. It is available for download from his Web site or straight from here. After download, it has to be filetyped as &FF8 and double-clicked to expand it. Do read the Help file before using it, as you need to transfer a file from inside the application to the S5 before it can be run (I didn't at first, and kept wondering why it wouldn't work!). If you're upgrading from an earlier version, you must replace that file on your S5 with the new one. You also don't use the Link on the Psion, which I confess I tried instinctively!

On running, a Psion icon appears on the right of the iconbar. You also have to make sure that the small file you transfered to the S5 is running there, and then you can click on the iconbar and see a filer display of the Psion. All you can do at the moment is transfer files as no conversions are built in (although these will be added in the future). Other restrictions (which may also change) are that it:

The first one will be removed on registration, greatly increasing the speed of the application. The others will all be addressed in later releases. They will also allow backing up and restoring, and hopefully start to include a file convertor or two.
Things that it now does include:

The current version is a beta, and can be registered for £29·95, and looks very promising as it continues to develop further. It is also cheaper than PsiRisc.

As it is, if you want something easier and simpler to use than Connector, this is your only choice apart from PsiRisc.

ArcLink Screen

Display of the this Web site in a directory of my S5, in ArcLink5

It does now preserve long filenames in the transfer as long as that is to a DOS Partition with Win95FS running, a SparkFS archive, or under XFiles. I'd recommend you consider getting one of those packages for backing up your S5. There's another helpful little utility (called JB5StopGo) that you might like to get as well, as it has been specially modifed to help in backing up via ArcLink5.

I've reviewed ArcLink5 more fully in the March issue of Archive Magazine.


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