Splitting the [a] from the Commodore Amiga - Games - [ADF] dat

[absence]

By the way, weren't there proper warez scene releases for a lot of disks on BBSes back in the days? In that case, wouldn't it be safe to delete all [a] that differ slightly from the actual release?

[Ian]

So, I'm doing a bit of renaming, is this acceptable:

Battle Chess (1988)(Interplay)[cr qtx][m Startup-Sequence needs WB or KS2+]

There is more wrong with it like it includes savegame file and something called ChessStuff taking up most of the disk not in the original cracks.

[PandMonium]

Hi Ian,

Yes the setname you provided there is free of TNC errors but that are some parts that can be improved.
First, the scene group abbreviations are mostly upper case so QTX. Then i would use startup-sequence in lower case since that is they way it tends to be used i think.

As for the rest, mai and others will have better suggestions but you can and should add the relevant info in the more info flag (the last flag, using []) if needed.
For instance "WB", "KS2+" and "added savegame and ChessStuff file" or something. Renamers currently working on Amiga will have better suggestions i'm sure

[mai]

Sorry, no suggestion by me for valid reason, i think.
We have already 23 sets of "Battle chess" in TOSEC.
If there is no important difference to existing sets, i dont add further sets of this game.
This would end up to have 1000000+ new sets, which are not really needed.
Currently i have ~20000 renamed sets on my HDD, which i will not include in TOSEC.

[PandMonium]

Humm interesting, 20000 is a lot. Why the hell there are so many alts for amiga? :|

[absence]

Originally Posted by PandMonium

Humm interesting, 20000 is a lot. Why the hell there are so many alts for amiga? :|

Because people didn't write protect their disks.

[PandMonium]

Yeah i kind know that, still they dump their disks and end up with a lot of dupes.
Pardon my Amiga ignorance but i guess that most of those sets will share most of the files and have things like altered highscores' tables, different/added savegames and so on, right?

Is there or would it be possible to code some kind of tool to check the similarities between these sets according the their files (in addition to the comparison based on the hash of the whole content (container))? That should be something fun to code, most of us lack the time i guess

[mai]

I am using such a (Windows) tool.
If a disk is a plain DOS disk, i check its content file by file using this tool and can see, where are the differences.

[PandMonium]

Which one? I see there are tools that let you mount and view the adf content indeed, i was just thinking about automating the process a bit more

Something that given a bunch of adfs say something like "these 20 sets share 85% of the content" and those are the files containing some differences or something like that. Is just that going through 100000 where most are alts should be a pain, no? :s

[mai]

"ADFCOMPARE"
Red marked is a difference.

[PandMonium]

awesome, that seems pretty helpful

[mai]

Originally Posted by PandMonium

awesome, that seems pretty helpful

a much better example, comparing Disks 2 of TOSEC version of
Dinosaurs Are Forever:
Dinosaurs Are Forever (1989)(Polarware)(Disk 2 of 2)[Electric Crayon]
Dinosaurs Are Forever (1989)(Polarware)(Disk 2 of 2)[a][Electric Crayon]
Using this tool i can clearly see, that the [a] version is the good one.
The non[a] version has corrupted files and even some files are missing.

[PandMonium]

That seems helpful, after all it's a bad dump i guess
Out of curiosity, how do you see that the alt is the good one? (Probably not from the image but just testing, right?)

[mai]

Originally Posted by PandMonium

That seems helpful, after all it's a bad dump i guess
Out of curiosity, how do you see that the alt is the good one? (Probably not from the image but just testing, right?)

I have not tested in Emulator, in this case its obviously, that the [a] version is the good one.
The non-[a] version has missing files, i can still find the filenames, if i use a hex-search, probably deleted files.
Also there are corrupted files, files, which have crc32, starting with value "00000" are corrupted, data areas filled with zeros.

[mai]

another example comparing:
Discovery v2.0 (1990)(MicroIllusions)(Disk 2 of 2)(Lessons)
Discovery v2.0 (1990)(MicroIllusions)(Disk 2 of 2)(Lessons)[cr SR]
Whats going on here, had to check it in Emulator too.
Both sets have the same files on disk, but different directory tree.
Checking in Emulator has the result, that
Discovery v2.0 (1990)(MicroIllusions)(Disk 2 of 2)(Lessons)
is not accepted by the game, wrong directory tree.

[Crashdisk]

Other example with NoDOS disk (can't use ADFRen/ADFCompare):

3 from 1 (1992)(Chryseis)
crc 96ffbe94
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b doscopy]
Work fine (WinUAE)

3 from 1 (1992)(chryseis)[a2]
crc b76f0197
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b2 doscopy]
typical error due to a copy with unsuitable tool (hexeditor)

3 from 1 (1992)(chryseis)[a3]
crc 78b69743
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)
typical error due to a copy with unsuitable tool (hexeditor)

3 from 1 (1992)(Chryseis)[a]
crc 2673e6f3
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b dump]
music corrupt (WinUAE)

[mai]

Originally Posted by Crashdisk

Other exemple with NoDOS disk:

3 from 1 (1992)(Chryseis)
crc 96ffbe94
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b doscopy]
Work fine (WinUAE)

3 from 1 (1992)(chryseis)[a2]
crc b76f0197
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b2 doscopy]
typical error due to a copy with unsuitable tool (hexeditor)

3 from 1 (1992)(chryseis)[a3]
crc 78b69743
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)
typical error due to a copy with unsuitable tool (hexeditor)

3 from 1 (1992)(Chryseis)[a]
crc 2673e6f3
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b dump]
music corrupt (WinUAE)

nice to see your efforts to make TOSEC collection more precise.
In the past they added and added and added images without carefully checking before.

[mai]

Originally Posted by Crashdisk

3 from 1 (1992)(Chryseis)
crc 96ffbe94
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b doscopy]
Work fine (WinUAE)

wait, works fine, but you call it [b]ad.

[Crashdisk]

lol, I typed faster than I thinking Fix v2

3 from 1 (1992)(Chryseis)
crc 96ffbe94
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b doscopy]
typical error due to a copy with unsuitable tool (hexeditor)

3 from 1 (1992)(chryseis)[a2]
crc b76f0197
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b2 doscopy]
typical error due to a copy with unsuitable tool (hexeditor)

3 from 1 (1992)(chryseis)[a3]
crc 78b69743
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)
Work fine (WinUAE)

3 from 1 (1992)(Chryseis)[a]
crc 2673e6f3
=> 3 from 1 (1993-05-27)(Chryseis)[b dump]
music corrupt (WinUAE)

[mai]

hopefully the fixed dats have no typos.