[usb-storage] ziptool

[Pat LaVarre <p.lavarre@ieee.org>]

> Subject: Re: [usb-storage] Re: [PATCH] fix Sony USB mass storage -
pass larger receive buffer
> ...
> > I ask just because you can't see the write-protect tab on a Zip disk
> > unless you use an electron microscope
> > so you might not know how to flip it.
> 
> You are not referring to things like "ziptool -ro" ?

Fruitful hint, thank you.  I find I now conjecture:

ziptool runs in Linux and makes an Iomega Zip disk writable or not.

ziptool wasn't known to me before now.  On first reading your concise
reply I actually confused `ziptool -ro` with the unrelated `cd .. ;  zip
-r gccscsi.zip gccscsi/`.

Since also I know Iomega Zip drives report PDT x00 HDD/Flash with RMB, I
agree Linux folk who possess Iomega Zip drives & disks could try testing
both rewritable and read-only disks in sd by way of ziptool.

I remain unlikely to try that approach soon myself, since I don't know
that I have any easy way of discovering what else ziptool does to Linux,
apart from actually toggling the write-protect tab inside an Iomega Zip
disk.

Pat LaVarre

P.S. I reach my conclusion in Three steps.

1)

I remember "Andries E. Brouwer" kindly does appear in:

http://www.google.com/search?q=link:members.aol.com/plscsi/

2)

I see I have no ziptool:

$ cat /etc/redhat-release
Red Hat Linux release 9 (Shrike)
$
$ man ziptool
No manual entry for ziptool
$
$ which ziptool
/usr/bin/which: no ziptool in (...)
$

3)

I see others do have ziptool:

http://www.google.com/search?q=ziptool

today yields:

http://freshmeat.net/projects/ziptool/?topic_id=136%2C861

"ZIPTool is a set of tools for controlling IOMega JAZ and ZIP drives
from Linux. It features locking and unlocking of media (with a
password), ejecting, spinning down drives, mounting, and unmounting.

Ignoring case, trailing blanks, leading blanks, and stuttered blanks, I
match such strings as "Iomega Zip" and "IOMEGA  " "ZIP 250         " to
the "IOMega ... ZIP" string I see here.