Boot Magic v1.0 by Bitz
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bitone
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Last modified May 6, 2018 4:43:33 PM
MD5 checksum 38d4ba8fa2832078eee3d877c23e6950
Mime type Zip archive data
Download boot_magic.zip
Size 192 kB
1994 January 24
Boot Magic is a collection of alternative boot sectors. We have
written a number of programs which each fit into a single 512-byte
sector. What they do varies: most are small graphics demos; a number
are games; a few are practical.
45 items in the archive
- BARS2.COM
- BMAGIC.DAT
- BMAGIC.DOC
- BMAGIC.EXE
- BMAGIC1B.ZIP
- BREAKOUT.COM
- CLOCK.COM
- COPPER.COM
- CYCLE.COM
- CYCLE2.COM
- DESCRIPT.ION
- DUMPINT.COM
- FILE_ID.DIZ
- FIREWORK.COM
- FLAME.COM
- FLY.COM
- INVADER.COM
- L120.COM
- L240.COM
- L60.COM
- LCS.COM
- LIFE.COM
- LITECYCL.COM
- MANDEL.COM
- MBOOT.COM
- MUSIC1.COM
- MUSIC2.COM
- NEVEREND.COM
- PLASMA.COM
- PLASMA2.COM
- PONG.COM
- PUZZLE.COM
- QUIX2.COM
- RSTAR.COM
- SATORI0.COM
- SATORI2.COM
- SATORI3.COM
- SATORI4.COM
- SATORI5.COM
- SCROLL.COM
- STARFI.COM
- STARS.COM
- STARSB.COM
- TETRIS.COM
- WPLASMA.COM
▓▓▒▒░░ ░
▓▒▒░░ Boot Magic ░▒
▒▒░░ ░░▒
▒░░ v1.0▀ ░░▒▒
░░ by BITZ ░░▒▒▓
░ ░░▒▒▓▓
─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── (C) 1994 ──
┌─────────┐
│ Credits │
└─────────┘
Bitz
BitZero Darren Oakey
BitOne Brett Alcorn
AndOr Brian Murray
┌─────────────┐
│Introduction │
└─────────────┘
The art of programming... by someone other than Knuth
To imagine the cumulative time spent programming around the world boggles
the mind. People ranging from suited accountancy majors to drug-high school
dropouts have sat in front of computers around the world, and, whether for
praise or profit, attempted to bend the machine beneath their will.
Trouble is, most of them hate it.
However, if we look closely, we can discover a tiny and arcane group. A
collection of young men and women dedicated to the production of quality code,
and contributing personally to the annual earnings of CocaCola International.
Many a midnight hour is spent feeding code into systems. This species has
transcended the bounds of language. Pascal? C? Assembler? How do they feel at
the time? The only thing that matters is the quality of the code.
But why? Billions of dollars have been spent to investigate this question.
(actually, thats a load of crap, but hey, it gives weight to the story).
Anyway, why?... Mostly just because it's fun. But, in their more egotistical
moods, these creatures often want to show their code to others, proving that
they are the true masters of the silicon. Thus is born the demo, a program
designed specifically to showcase the ego of its creator.
Fortunately, today the world is linked by computers. This community has
global communication with relative ease. A situation arises where people have
access to many demos, all trying to prove that their creator thinks in binary,
and could reprogram the universe if he/she/it could be bothered.
Although each strives to be the best, only one may sit on the pinnacle (the
pinnacle is not all that big..). It becomes necessary to find criteria to
judge these demos. This is not as easy as it seems. Some groups cheat,
acquiring talented artists and musicians behind whose products they can easily
camouflage ordinary code. (We have obviously not done this..) An objective
method of judging is necessary.
Once this is realised, logic dictates the remainder of the answer. There is
only one skill in coding. Take an example. To create a purely realistic
simulation of any multimedia effect, one needs nothing more than a video camera
and a large hard disk. To create an instantaneous mandelbrot viewer, one needs
only a state table containing a value for each possible input. As some viewers
are limited to 16 bit fixed point arithmetic anyway, a 4 gigabyte table should
be quite sufficient.
From the examples, it is trivial to determine what the only skill of coding
is. We have seen that speed optimization is trivial. Simulating any effect is
likewise easy. The only problem, the only skill that is ever involved while
coding, is the solution of a problem at a smaller size than would be
immediately obvious.
Therefore the smallest code is the best :)
┌────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ A (quick) Introduction to Boot Sectors │
└────────────────────────────────────────┘
The first sector on a disk is called the boot sector. It is so
named because this sector contains a small (512 byte) program which
is run when the disk is booted. On "non-bootable" floppies, this
program usually displays a message like:
"Non-bootable disk.
Please insert another disk and press any key."
On "bootable" floppies, the boot sector is responsible for loading the
DOS system files.
┌────────────────────┐
│ What's Boot Magic? │
└────────────────────┘
Boot Magic is a collection of alternative boot sectors. We have
written a number of programs which each fit into a single 512-byte
sector. What they do varies: most are small graphics demos; a number
are games; a few are practical.
Boot Magic allows you to write any of these boot sectors to your
floppy disks. Once written, booting the floppy will run the program.
Why do you want to use Boot Magic? Well .... good question. It's
fun! It also provides protection against (a few) rudimentary boot
sector viruses. We wrote them as a challenge - to pack as much as we
could into 512 bytes.
┌───────────────────────┐
│ How to Use Boot Magic │
└───────────────────────┘
The main screen has six (mouse operated) buttons:
Up / Down Scroll through the list of boot sectors
Test Test the current boot sector
A: / B: Write the current boot sector to floppy drive A/B
Exit Exit Boot Magic
Alternatively, you can use the keys:
Up up arrow, left arrow
Down down arrow, right arrow
Test T
Exit E, Esc
A: A
B: B
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ Gee, All This Boot Sector Stuff Sounds Dangerous... │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
Don't worry. Writing a Boot Magic boot sector to your floppies will
not damage your files or data. The boot sector does contain some
critical information about the disk characteristics, but these are
left totally unmolested by Boot Magic.
For those of you who are paranoid, you can simply remove the
boot sectors using your favorite tool, eg Norton's Utilities.
┌─────────────────────┐
│ System Requirements │
└─────────────────────┘
To run Boot Magic you need:
- a 386 or better
- a mouse driver loaded
- a VGA compatible display
- Soundblaster or Adlib (optional)
┌─────────┐
│ Licence │
└─────────┘
This program may only be used subject to the conditions below.
The user agrees to assume all liability when using this program.
The authors are disclaimed from any liability for any damage
resulting from use of this program.
The copyright of Boot Magic, and all the files provided with it,
belongs to Brett Alcorn and Darren Oakey, 1994. However, you are
permitted and encouraged to distribute Boot Magic in its complete
form to friends, colleagues, bulletin boards etc.
If you are not a business, this program is provided free of charge.
We ask, however, that if you like the program, you send us a
postcard to the addresses below, preferably one that reflects
your home or country.
If you are a business, this program IS NOT FREE. You must pay for
the program by sending us each some advertising trinket. For
example, a badged T-shirt, calculator, frisbee, pen, calender,
or computer.
┌──────────────────┐
│ Hear Ye, Hear Ye │
└──────────────────┘
We are inviting submissions now for Boot Magic II. It is hoped that it will
become a regular quaterly production, and we need more boot sectors. Send us
your sector, and as long as it is obviously not stolen from someone else, we
will include it in our next package. Authors will be given full credit for
their work.
We would also like some feedback on how you found the package, which
sectors you liked the best, and so on. If you have some free time,
please send us a postcard!
┌────────────┐
│ About BITZ │
└────────────┘
To contact us:
BitZero - Darren Oakey
internet email [email protected]
mail 44 Meluca Crescent
Hornsby Heights, NSW
Australia 2077
BitOne - Brett Alcorn
internet email [email protected]
mail 12 Victoria Street
Epping, NSW
Australia 2121
For a small fee we can produce custom boot sectors.