From John.Peters@tip.csiro.au  Thu Jul 22 06:17:43 1999
From: John.Peters@tip.csiro.au (John Peters)
Date: Thu, 22 Jul 1999 15:17:43 +1000 (EST)
Subject: reluctant to read win95 directory (PR#231)
In-Reply-To: <x2vhbdo7ay.fsf@blueberry.kubism.ku.dk> from Peter Dalgaard BSA at "Jul 22, 99 02:29:57 am"
Message-ID: <199907220517.PAA06830@dylan.tip.CSIRO.AU>

Peter Dalgaard BSA writes:

> John.Peters@tip.csiro.au writes:
> 
> > Using rw0642 under win95, on executing from a directory on the c: drive:
> > 
> >    system("command.com /c dir", intern=T)
> > 
> > there is a whirring from drive a: (empty), then the message appears in a 
> > dos box:
> > 
> >    General failure reading device aLP!!?
> >    Abort, Retry, Fail?
> 
> Not that I know anything about Windows, but is there a chance that the
> machine goes looking for command.com on the diskette? I.e. you want
> c:\\windows\\command.com instead.


I'm afraid not.  Even 

  system("c:\\windows\\command.com /c dir c:",intern=T)

behaves the same, ie fails several times with the above message, then 
works fine until the next reboot.  A further detail: the whirring on 
drive a: only occurs on the first attempt; thereafter the drive is silent 
as if the result is cached.

Maybe also relevant:

1. I'm starting R from a desktop shortcut with the opening directory 
   named in the "Start in:" box.  Exercising the R pulldown "File - 
   Change dir" doesn't help.
      
2. This also happened with rw0641, but not in an earlier version (not sure 
   which).

Thanks

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Peters
CSIRO National Measurement Laboratory
PO Box 218                                Phone:    +61 2 9413 7503
Lindfield NSW 2070                        Fax:      +61 2 9413 7202
Australia                                 Internet: John.Peters@tip.CSIRO.AU
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reluctant to read win95 directory (PR#231)
John Peters