[Atari800-users] Re: monitor.[ch]

[Janka G. <ger...@si...>]

Nathan Hartwell wrote:
> Also, I noticed that the ATR header is processed in such a way
> that the last header byte is used as a read-only flag.  I found a web page
> that listed only bit 0 of that byte is used for read-only, so I adjusted the
> SIO_Mount() code to check that bit only.  Also, I added a definition for bit
> 1 of that byte to make the image look like a hard drive (1 track with x
> sectors).  HDINIT.COM can now format an ATR.  I was thinking of coding the
> 0xEC command (to emulate the IDE interfaces) into the SIO() function.  I
> suppose it'd have to go into the Command_Frame() function, too.  Any
> thought/objections to that idea?  Granted, nothing else uses/supports that
> bit 1 flag for HD mode, but I didn't feel like coding a whole new disk image
> format.

As I pointed out before, the ATR header definition in Atari800
does not match the original definition by Nick Kennedy. I once
tried to write a definition that would work with either APE and
SIO2PC ATRs but somehow never succeeded in getting it in the
official source. But basically, except the meaning of some header
bytes the two ATR variances are the same.
In contrary to that, what you propose is a different format and
I would think it much cleaner to name it that way to avoid confusion.
How about AHI ( Atari Harddisk Image ) ;-) and at least a different
'magic number' in the first two header bytes too ?

Gerhard