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RISC OS 'Booter' utility

booter.zip (2,585 bytes). Suitable for all machines with the universal !Boot structure (or equivalent).

This is my 2K tool entry for the Code Craft #3 competition, which managed to win joint 1st place :)

It will scan your hard disc for applications, collating the boot files and icon sprites so that they can all get loaded at once. This ensures your computer always knows where to find the program needed for certain file types, all file types have their icons, etc.

Usage:

  1. Extract the archive to somewhere writable
  2. Run SetDir
  3. Run Booter
  4. Wait as your disc is scanned
  5. Place the produced !Booter application somewhere useful in your Boot sequence, e.g. Choices.Boot.PreDesk (I think!)

Known problems:

  • No apps inside !Boot will be scanned. This is done by design, to prevent any nastyness occuring.
  • Likewise, any application called !Booter will also be ignored.
  • Boot files which uses strange mixes of upper and lower case may not be processed properly.
  • It can take a long time to run if you have lots of files on your disc.
  • It won't search image files or archives (But usually you wouldn't want it to do that anyway).
  • It only searches for !Sprites22 and !Sprites sprite files, since they are the most commonly used.
  • There's no documentation in the source code, in order to fit it into the 2K size limit.
  • If multiple programs attempt to claim ownership of the same file type, there's no guarantee which one Booter will choose to listen to.

If you hit the max application limit (2000), open the source and change the 'map' variable to a higher number.



Page last modified 03/03/2005