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Commodore_Free_Issue_19_2008_Commodore_Computer_Club.d64
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t.dirmaster 2
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DIRMASTER version 2
http://style64.org
DirMaster is a Windows graphical disk
management tool for manipulating
commodore disk images using windows
drop and drag features and supporting
a wide range of disk image types, but
it is a lot more than that.
DirMaster
How do you improve on the best!, I
guess you just have to listen to
feedback and make your application
that bit more special. Well that's
exactly what's happened with DirMaster.
This is a superb tool, that has
recently been updated to version 2.0;
and although I looked at an earlier
version in C= Free magazine I decided
to do a full review of version 2.0
To install DirMaster you will need a
Windows machine with either windows
2000, Windows XP or Vista although the
documentation says it may work with
windows 98 there are no promises to
that effect. As with all Windows
installations you will need to have
administrator privilege over your
machine. Download the installation
package and double click to install
it's that simple.
But hey aren't there hundreds of these
tools available for creating and
manipulating Commodore Disk images?
Well yes there are versions for DOS as
well as windows and they all work,
some are clumsy and some do support
dropping and dragging some are quite
good but nothing seems as slick as
this application, read on and you will
see why.
Smooth as silk
First let me explain the dragging and
dropping on the application, select a
file lets say it's a text document,
first run the DirMaster and create or
open a disk image now left click the
file and HOLD the mouse button, drag
the file onto the disk image and then
let the mouse button go, hey presto as
if by magic the text file is now in
the disk image this function alone is
a real timesaver, I am sure windows
users will appreciate this.
The opposite also works so lets say
you have a text file in a disk image
and you want to extract it to another
folder or your windows desktop for
example, open the disk image, and left
click the file HOLD the mouse button
down and move the file to its new
location on the desktop or in another
folder, let go of the mouse button and
the file is extracted! Double
clicking on the text file in the disk
image will open the file for reading
as shown in the screen shot of Issue
17 March 2008 Editor comments.
Hey wait that's just one feature of
the application; You could for example
open 2 disk images & copy files between
the 2 using drop and drag. You can also
open the application & drag a disk
image onto the running application;
this will open the disk image for
viewing.
Or you can run the application and
select file Open but that's just a
bit dull. You can multi select disk
images, drag them over the running
application and they will open in
separate windows for viewing. Disk
images that have changed by adding
modifying or deleting files will show
there status of a change without being
saved by adding an asterisk to the
file name as shown the disk image is
godot127.d64 I changed one of the
files by deleting it and the disk
status has changed to godot127.d64 *
Ok I am getting way to excited lets
look at some of the menu items
starting left to right
Open a Disk image
Well fairly self explanatory click this
icon to open a disk image for viewing
or editing, also when installed if you
want you can have the application
assign itself to d64,d81 etc so double
clicking a Disk image will open a disk
image
Save a Disk Image
Guess what this saves the current disk
image, also closing the disk image will
prompt the user 'the disk image has
changed do you wish to save'
Find disk
Very nice feature you can hunt for a
file in a disk image by selecting a
folder to search and giving the
filename as shown below
Show Commodore tool
Pops open a box with the Commodore
character set, inversed video normal,
small case and commodore characters
you can then click on one to enter it
in the name of your applications title
Show separator tool
some disk images use separators
between filenames clicking this tool
provides a preset number of separator
files for the user to click and enter
into there disk image
Change the case
Toggles the case in a disk image or in
a text file so upper case letters
become lower case and vice a versa
File Properties
Shows the properties of a selected
file giving Name/Type(prg etc.)/file-
size/track & sector/date etc.
BAM Edit
If you dont know what BAM edit is this
won't be any use to you,
Move Up or Down
Moves the file in a disk image up or
down so it's higher or lower in the
disk listing order
Jump to sector
Opens the Sector editing tool
Change to parent directory
Toggle font size
Changes the size of the text and so
reduces the size of the disk image
windows there are 2 sizes normal and
small to toggle between
Toggles Hidden characters
Turns on/off hidden characters in file
Show Deleted files
Toggles on/of the display of deleted
files in the disk image
Colours
Changes the display background and
text of a disk image purely cosmetic
the first sets the background colour
the second the text colour, again this
is just the amount of attention to
detail the programmers have added to
the application, its not an essential
item to have but makes things easier
on the eye
These are the main parts of the
program you will use again all very
intuitive and if you cant remember
what one of the icons does hovering
over it will show a text hint,
Other functions from the pull down
menu are Validate disk, batch
processing
If you click in the disk window on a
BASIC program for example, then you
are shown the listing of the basic
application shown below is a disk from
Loadstar, the loader application is in
BASIC and double-clicking on the file
opens up a box with the basic listed,
right clicking on the text allows the
copying of selected text to windows
clipboard and pasting into any
application as shown below (a selection
of the highlighted text) I would have
liked to have seen an option to print
the text preserving the C= character
set & special characters
DV=PEEK(186):IFDV<8THENDV=8
5 POKE32767,13:POKE53371,0
6 POKE65534,1:REM S-KEY ON
10 POKE53281,0:POKE53280,0:PRINT
rstuvwxyz
[]"":IFPEEK(653)=0THENPOKE53265,11:
GOSUB100
11 POKE53265,27:TQ=TI:POKE198,0:
IFPEEK(653)=0THENGOSUB1000:GOTO13
12 POKE53280,11:POKE53281,11:GOTO50
13 REM
Also the display can be toggled
between 40 and 80 column mode to allow
more or less text on the screen,
But I am really out of space in this
what was supposed to be a mini review
The minimise maximise & red cross close
buttons and the borders of the screen
in the DirMaster review are copyrighted
to Microsoft corporation as well as the
trademarks Windows, Windows 98, Windows
2000, Windows Vista & windows XP & the
abbreviations XP,Vista,98,2K