A         L    .    .    .    .    .    .    .    .    .    .    .    R
|-2
|
|
|
|
|         [z][h]LANDMARK SOFTWARE[]
|            [z]=1142 Pomegranate Court    Sunnyvale CA 94087    408-733-4035[][~LM]
|


        [b]IMPORTANT:[]  FILLER and the other programs in the LANDMARK 
          UTILITIES package are neither public domain nor shareware 
          programs.  Rather, they are commercial programs.  The cost of 
          the LANDMARK UTILITIES package is $29.95.  Companies wishing 
          to bundle any or all of these program should contact Landmark 
          Software for bundling prices.  Dealers should ask about our 
          DealerPak.  Corporate users should contact us about multiple 
          copy agreements and site licenses.


                              [b]What Does FILLER Do?[]

               In brief, FILLER lets you create a file of any size you 
          want in the root directory of whatever drive you specify.  We 
          refer to the resulting file as a 'filler' file because its 
          primary purpose is to take up space--the content of the file 
          is unimportant.  The filler file is always named $FILLER$.  
          It has its archive bit turned turned off and its readonly bit 
          turned on.


                    [b]Why Would I Want To Create a Filler File?[]

               FILLER is an example of a program that was written for 
          one purpose but which turned out to be even more useful for a 
          different purpose:  Performance testing of hard disks & hard 
          disk controllers.


                      [b]Filler Files for Bernoulli Cartridges[]

               The original purpose of FILLER was to create filler 
          files on Bernoulli Box cartridges in connection with the 
          'multicopy' option of Landmark's LBACKUP backup program.  
          Because the LBACKUP's invaluable 'multicopy' option permits 
          multiple versions of files to be accumulated on the backup 
          media, it's essential that the data on the primary Bernoulli 
          cartridge be kept considerably smaller than the capacity of 
          the Bernoulli cartridge that is used as the backup for the 
          primary cartridge.  The creation of a large filler file on 
          each primary Bernoulli cartridge assures that the cartridge 
          won't become 'too full'.  By turning off the archive bit, we 
          assure that the filler file won't inadvertently be backed 
          up--which would destroy the whole purpose of having the 
          filler file in the first place.  By turning on the readonly 
          bit, we assure that the filler file won't be accidentally 
          deleted.  The content of each filler file is fixed up so that 
          typing it to the screen produces only a brief message, not a 
          long stream of useless data.
|
|
|
|
|                                     - 1 -
|
|
|-2
|
|
|
|
|
                  [b]Using FILLER to Test Hard Disks & Controllers[]

               The less esoteric use of FILLER is to easily create a 
          large file of exact size that can be used to determine the 
          continuous effective transfer rate of a hard disk/controller 
          combination on a particular machine.  This should be done 
          immediately after formatting the hard disk.  Use the command 
          [b]FILLER C: 5120K[] to create a file that's exactly 5 megabytes 
          in size.  Use [b]CHKDSK C:\$FILLER$[] to verify that the filler 
          file is contiguous.  (If it isn't contiguous, use the command 
          [b]FILLER C: 0K[] to remove the filler file.  Then either delete 
          some files--if there are any to delete--or add some files to 
          use up the discontiguous areas.  Then recreate the filler 
          file and try CHKDSK again.)  Reboot with [b]BUFFERS=12[] in your 
          CONFIG.SYS.  Then use a stop watch to time how long it takes 
          to execute the command [b]COPY $FILLER$ NUL[].  Divide the result 
          in seconds into the 5120K size of the filler file to 
          determine the transfer rate.  For example, if it takes 20.0 
          seconds, then 5120K/20.0 sec = 256K/sec which means that the 
          [b]continuous effective transfer rate[] is 256K bytes per second.  
          You'll find that the result is lower than that produced by 
          Gibson's SPINTEST which measures the effective transfer rate 
          while reading a single track--a measure that's only 
          meaningful if the data being read is so small that it's not 
          spread over more than one track.  The results from the CORE 
          test program are usually somewhere in between the SPINTEST 
          and the FILLER results.

               The command [b]FILLER ?[] will summarize the syntax and 
          options available.

















                         [z][g]Landmark Software[]
                             [b]1142 Pomegranate Court[]
                               [b]Sunnyvale, CA 94087[]
                                  [b]408-733-4035[]

|
|
|
|
|
|                                     - 2 -
|
|
|-