dskform(1)

✨ dskform(1) — floppy & image file formatter for emulated machines ✨

okay bestie, welcome to dskform, from the Emulators manual section 💖 this is the little tool that formats floppies and disc images so your emulated machines can actually read them. no filesystem though — she just formats, she does not decorate. periodt.

🌸 NAME 🌸

dskform — floppy or image file formatter for emulated machines 🦋

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

dskform [-format FORMAT] [-type TYPE] [-side SIDE] [-comp COMP] [-retry
COUNT] [-fat12] DISKIMAGE

💅 DESCRIPTION 💅

Dskform is a formatter, bestie. it formats floppy discs or disc images so they work with emulated machines like the ZX Spectrum +3, the Amstrad CPC, and various Acorn machines ✨

💀 heads up though: it does not create a filesystem on the disc or image. formatting only. no filesystem. that's somebody else's job, not hers.

✨ OPTIONS ✨

• -format FORMAT — tells her which disc format to use 🎀 peep the DISK FORMATS section below for the tea.
• -type TYPE — decides which driver gets to format the disc or image 🚗
  • auto — pick based on the disc image file. this is the default 💖
  • dsk — use the DSK (CPCEmu format) image driver.
  • edsk — use the extended version of the DSK format 👑
  • floppy — use the floppy driver 🍓
  • myz80 — use the hard disk (MYZ80 format) image driver. (this format cannot be autodetected.)
  • cfi — use the CFI (DOS fdcopy format) image driver. (this format cannot be autodetected.)
  • apridisk — use the ApriDisk image driver (used for archiving Apricot floppies). (this format cannot be autodetected.)
  • raw — use the raw driver.
• -comp COMP — compress the disc image that's being generated ✨ (does nothing when you're formatting a real floppy disc, no cap)
  • sq — Huffman compressed (SQ / USQ).
  • gz — Gzipped (gzip / gunzip).
• -retry COUNT — set how many times to attempt a format operation if there's an error 🔁
• -side SIDE — determines which side (0 or 1) of the disc is to be formatted 🌈
• -pcdos — create an empty PCDOS (FAT12) filesystem on the disc image 💾
• -apricot — create an empty Apricot MSDOS filesystem on the disc image 🍑

🦋 DISK FORMATS 🦋

the whole menu, babe, nothing skipped:

• pcw180 — PCW or IBM; 180K. this is the default format ⭐
• cpcsys — CPC or +3 System
• cpcdata — CPC or +3 Data
• pcw720 — PCW or IBM 720K
• pcw1440 — PCW16 or IBM 1440K
• ibm160 ibm320 — IBM 160K or 320K (CP/M-86 or DOSPlus)
• ibm360 — IBM 360K (DOSPlus)
• ibm720 ibm1200 ibm1440 — IBM 720K, 1200K or 1440K (144FEAT)
• acorn160 acorn320 — Acorn ADFS 'S' or 'M'
• acorn640 — Acorn ADFS 'L'
• acorn800 — Acorn ADFS 'D' and 'E'/'E+'
• acorn1600 — Acorn ADFS 'F'/'F+'
• pcw800 — PCW 800K (XCF2DD)
• pcw200 — PCW 200K (XCF2)
• bbc100 — BBC Micro DFS (single sided, 40 tracks)
• bbc200 — BBC Micro DFS (single sided, 80 tracks)

👑 AUTHOR 👑

John Elliott <seasip.webmaster@gmail.com> 💖

Darren Salt wrote the man pages ✍️

and that's the whole page, bestie 🫶 this was Version 1.5.9, dated 17 September 2018 — mwah, iconic, go format something 💅✨