[ale] cdrecord creates cd readable on Linux/NT NOT Win95?

[Michael H. Warfield]

Wandered Inn enscribed thusly:
> Tony Scalzitti wrote:

> > Well as I remember Win95 has a prob. with multi-session CD's due to a bug in
> > its vfs layer for CD ROM's.  This could be the problem, not to mention the
> > fact that most MS bugs are far more wide reaching then just one error msg.

> It wasn't a multi-session cd, but I figured it out, I think.  I was
> creating the image using mkisofs, which apparently does not have the
> Joliet support as I had previously stated.  I used mkhybrid to create a
> new image that has the Joliet support and the disk is now accessible via
> win95.  Weird thing is, when I first got my cd writer, I copied an
> existing windows disk using mkisofs and it works fine.  Whatever...

	Make sure you also add the "-pad" option to cdrecord any time
you are creating a CD from a new image (but not when you are burning
a CD from an image copied from a CD).  The -pad option adds a trailer
of 30K 00 bytes to pad out the data track.  Some versions of Windows 95
and some OLD versions of Linux had troubles similar to what you described
on a FEW of the CDs (length dependent) if the trailer was not present.
I also found that CD mastering houses will not take the CD to be mastered
for pressing if that trailer is missing.

	Your version of mkisofs is also way out of date (and mkhybrid
is older that the latest mkisofs as well).  The only thing that mkhybrid
will do that mkisofs won't is to create Mac formated CD's.

	Versions of mkisofs 1.12 and above (1.12b5 is the latest and
1.12b4 is included with cdrecord 1.8) support Joliet (-J).  Versions of
mkisofs 1.12b3 and below also have an interesting "bug" when creating
CD's with dot files (files and directories that begin with a dot) in
the root directory.  You have to enabled leading dot support (-L) to make
the file system on the CD this way.

	The bug is in the directory sorting algorithm and results in the
root ".." directory not being in the second directory slot.  This doesn't
bother Linux, *BSD or several other operating systems, which don't notice
anything wrong with the CD at all, but it causes a BSOD (Blue Screen Of
Death) for Windows NT.  :-)  Just just click on the CD icon and "It's dead,
Fred" (which promptly became the name of the "exploit" CD).  I don't know
what effect it would have on Windows 95.

	I reported it to Microsoft and I think they fixed it in SP5 (maybe).
I also reported it to the authors of cdrecord (Joerg Schilling) and mkisofs
(Eric Youngdale) and they fixed it there as well.  I had figured out that
it was the existance of the unmapped "dot" files that was causing it.
Microsoft discovered that it was because the ".." directory was in directory
slot 5 instead of slot 2 on the CD I sent them.  Eric then discovered the
bug in the sorting algorithm.

	I was tempted to leave a bunch of the "It's Dead Fred" CD's laying
around the office labled "Quake-III beta 12" or something just to "smoke
test" the other engineers.  :-)  Decided to pass, though.  "Paybacks" are
very literally HELL at Internet Security Systems!  :-) ;-/ :->

> > -T
> > 
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Wandered Inn <esoteric at denali.atlnet.com>
> > To: ale <ale at ale.org>
> > Sent: Tuesday, August 17, 1999 6:51 PM
> > Subject: [ale] cdrecord creates cd readable on Linux/NT NOT Win95?
> > 
> > > Anyone know why a cd created with cdrecord would be readable on Linux
> > > and NT, but NOT windows 95?  I get an error that indicates the drive is
> > > not ready???  Tried the same cd on three win95 machines.
> > >
> > > --
> > > Until later: Geoffrey esoteric at denali.atlnet.com
> > >
> > > It should be illegal to yell "Y2K" in a crowded economy.
> > > -- Larry Wall, creator of the programming language Perl
> > >
> 
> --
> Until later: Geoffrey		esoteric at denali.atlnet.com
> 
> It should be illegal to yell "Y2K" in a crowded economy.
> 	-- Larry Wall, creator of the programming language Perl
> 


-- 
 Michael H. Warfield    |  (770) 985-6132   |  mhw at WittsEnd.com
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