PROBING FOR AVAILABLE FLOPPY DRIVES¶

floppy --probe

This command probes the hardware and reports on the available floppy drives. A typical output from --probe would be:

floppy 0.16 Copyright 2001-2003, Double Precision, Inc.
floppy    /dev/fd0: 3.5" HD
idefloppy /dev/hda: LS-120 VER5 00 UHD Floppy


  Revision: F523M5A9


  Serial number: 9803M9A03464

Here, floppy detected a high density floppy drive on /dev/fd0, and an IDE floppy drive on /dev/hda.

CREATING A CONFIGURATION FILE¶

A configuration file, /etc/floppy must be created before floppy can format floppy disks. This configuration file can be created automatically by the --createrc option. Each line in the configuration file contains the following information: type<TAB>label<TAB>device. "<TAB>" is a single ASCII TAB character. "device" is the device entry for the floppy drive. floppy requires that all requests for formatting floppies must use only the devices that appear in this configuration file. "label" is an alias for this device. floppy accepts "label:" instead of the actual device entry, for example: "floppy --format A:". "type" is either "floppy" or "idefloppy".

The --createrc option sets "A" as the label for the first floppy drive, and "B" for the second floppy drive. If --createrc finds more than two floppy drives, --createrc will use "FA", "FB", "FC", and so on.

DETERMINING AVAILABLE FORMAT CAPACITIES¶

Most floppy drives can format disks of different capacities. The --capacity option shows possible format capacities on the specified floppy device. A typical IDE floppy drive may report the following capacities:

$ floppy --capacity B:
Formattable capacities for /dev/hda:


  80x36x512       (1.40 Mb)


  80x30x512       (1.17 Mb)


  56x22x1024      (1.20 Mb)

A standard floppy drive attached to the floppy controller may report the following capacities:

$ floppy --capacity A:
Formattable capacities for /dev/fd0:


  80x36x512       (/dev/fd0H1440, 1.40 Mb)


  80x18x512       (/dev/fd0D720, 720 Kb)


  80x48x512       (/dev/fd0u1920, 1.87 Mb)


  80x28x512       (/dev/fd0u1120, 1.09 Mb)


  80x40x512       (/dev/fd0u1660, 1.56 Mb)


  80x26x512       (/dev/fd0u1040, 1.01 Mb)


  80x46x512       (/dev/fd0u1840, 1.79 Mb)


  80x42x512       (/dev/fd0u1680, 1.64 Mb)

The --capacity option reports each available format capacity as "cylinders x blocks-per-cylinder x block size". IDE floppy drive only return a total block count, and --capacity tries some common blocks-per-cylinder geometries, until it finds one that fits. Format capacities of standard floppy drives are obtained from the floppy device driver.

$ floppy --capacity A:
Formattable capacities for /dev/hda:


  6848x36x512     (120.37 Mb)

FORMATTING¶

The --format option does a low-level format on the floppy.

$ ./floppy --format --size=80x36x512 A:
Formatting 1.40 Mb...   0%

--size must specify a geometry returned by --capacity. If --size is absent, the first geometry is selected.

For floppy controller drives, the status counter will go from 0% to 100%. With most IDE floppy drives the counter will remain at 0% until the format finishes. Some IDE floppy drives are capable of reporting format progress status, which will would allow --format to count up from 0% to 100%.

$ ./floppy --format --verify A:

The --verify option verifies the low-level format. For floppy controller drives, the floppy disk is read from start to finish, after the low-level format concludes. For IDE floppy drives, the format request to the drive sets a flag that that requests low-level format verification.

$ ./floppy --format -V A:

The -V option is like --verify except that IDE floppy drive formats are verified manually - like floppy controller drive formats - by reading the floppy disk from start to finish.