QINIT                 Apple Programmer's Workshop Manual               QINIT

NAME
     qinit - quick disk initialization

SYNOPSIS
     qinit [-p][-f][-m] .device | /volume [/volume]

DESCRIPTION

     QInit formats disks using the standard GS/OS disk formatting routines. 
     It can speed up the formatting of a disk that has already been
     formatted by simply erasing it with new volume information.  Formatting
     takes nearly a minute, while erasing takes about a second or two since
     it does not involve writing zeros to every byte on the disk.

     QInit requires at least one argument, a device or volume name to
     specify the disk that is to be formatted.  An optional volume name can
     be specified which will become the new name of the formatted disk.  If
     left out, /Blank is chosen, unless the disk is readable, in which case
     the existing name is retained.
     
     The following options are recognized:

     -p   Progress reporting.  

     -f   Forces complete formatting for disks previously initialized.

     -m   Following the standard GS/OS formatting, blocks are written
          to the disk to create a Macintosh HFS diskette.  At present,
          only a Macintosh or special utilities (like A2FX) can read
          disks formatted with this option.  The disk is always named
          "Untitled" regardless of any optional volume name given.

     Examples:

          qinit .d2           - format .d2 as "/Blank" (or existing name)
          qinit /ram5         - erase /ram5
          qinit -f .d1 /foo   - format .d2 as "/foo"
          qinit -pm .d2       - erase .d2 as an "Untitled" Macintosh disk
          
AUTHOR
     Morgan Davis.  Public domain.  This program can be used from any
     GS/OS launching system (Finder, ProSel, etc) by changing its
     file type to S16.

Printed 10/28/90            28 October 1990                         1