TECHNICAL INFORMATION DOCUMENT

TITLE:  TF2105 - Floppy Driver
DATE:  17NOV95
README FOR:  TF2105
PRODUCT and VERSION:

UnixWare 2.01

Installation Instructions:  

DATATYPE: datastream

1.  Download the tf2105.Z and tf2105.txt files to the /tmp directory
    on your machine.

2.  Read the release notes contained in this file and follow the 
    instuctions to add the package to your system.

3.  Now become root, uncompress the file and add the package to your 
    system using the following commands:

        $ su
        # uncompress /tmp/tf2105.Z
        # pkgadd -d /tmp/tf2105

ENGINEERING RELEASE NOTES
-------------------------

Title
-----

PTF2105 - Floppy Driver Patch (Revised)

Version
-------

1.2

Product And Version
-------------------

UnixWare 2.01, UnixWare 2.02

Abstract
--------

Floppy diskettes properly formatted and performance improvements
for pkgadd from diskette with a 1:1 interleave.

Symptom
--------

1) Format floppy diskette properly:
     This may occur on systems with more than 16MB of memory
     where the format command indicates that a floppy diskette
     was successfully formatted, but accessing the diskette
     afterward indicates that it is unformatted.

2) Pkgadd from diskette with 1:1 interleaving is very poor:
     The floppy driver performs reads on a sector by sector basis
     is the reason for the poor performance.

3) Desktop hang fix during access of the floppy device:
     When the Desktop MediaMgr is executed to access the floppy device,
     the window hangs with the floppy access light on.


SOLUTION SPECIFICS
------------------

General Description.
-------------------

The floppy driver was upgraded as follows:

1) The buffer allocation logic was changed to use buffer space
   that had the proper constraints applied to ensure it was in
   DMA'able space for the format command to succeed as indicated.

2) The driver now performs a track read into an internal buffer
   then copy the requested sectors out from the track buffer to
   increase performance.

3) A busy flag was added to the driver to eliminate the hang when
   /sbin/fstyp is executed.  /sbin/fstyp performs numerous filesystem
   types device opens quickly,  and a previous open of the device is
   still being cleaned up when the next open occurs and thereby hangs
   the process/device.  
   
A new format command is installed to improve the verification
performance and change the default interleave from 2 to 1.

New Features.
------------

None.

Software Notes and Recommendations.
----------------------------------

NOTE: After this PTF is installed or removed, the system must
be rebooted immediately for the floppy device(s) to work.

This PTF should be installed on UnixWare 2.01, or 2.02 systems
for which floppy formatting fails, package installation via floppy
is slow, or the Desktop MediaMgr hangs during floppy access.

If installed on UnixWare 2.01 and UnixWare Update 2.02 is
installed at some future date, this PTF DOES NOT need to be
re-installed after UnixWare Update 2.02.

NOTE: The format command installed with the base installation of
UnixWare 2.01 uses as its default an interleave of 2 during the
formatting of diskettes.  This interleave setting now causes long
access and transfer delays with the new floppy driver being installed.
For packaging diskettes this can be corrected by package transferring
(pkgtrans) the image to your filesystem and re-format the diskettes
with an interleave of 1 (default of the new format command).  Once all
of the diskettes have been re-formated, pkgtrans the package from
your filesystem onto the floppies.

Testing of the modified software contained in this package has been
conducted only to the extent necessary to confirm that it resolves the
problem(s) stated above ("Symptom").  Such testing consists of
recreating the problem conditions (typically in a Novell test
laboratory) and verifying that the problem no longer occurs.  No other
testing of this software has been done.


Hardware Notes and Recommendations.
----------------------------------

This PTF is targeted for the i386, i486 and Pentium CPU's.

Installation Instructions.
-------------------------

If PTF2105 Version 1.1 is currently installed, it must be removed
before installing Version 1.2.

If at the end of PTF2105 installation (pkgadd has not completed) and
the floppy drive is being accessed (floppy indicator light comes on),
change to the root console window (ALT SYSRQ H).  Is the following
message displayed:

WARNING: FD(0): No diskette present - Please insert

If so, insert a formatted diskette and pkgadd should complete.


A system reboot is REQUIRED following the installation or
removal of this PTF.