Hi Bernd,

Wow, that's feedback! :-)

I've made a 0.2 version and set up a project in Sourceforge with a Git
repository: http://sourceforge.net/p/vmsmount

> Apparently not (yet) as a normal drive letter, instead *under* a
> driveletter.

See below, this was intentional.

> Helpscreen is also messy (do a cleanboot by F5 or F8, then execute
> VMSMOUNT and see all the environment warning texts kinda concatenated
> instead of each their own line)

Argh, silly bug. Fixed, thanks.

> What I was missing in the documentation is how to create/set a shared
> folder:
> * select a non-active virtual machine
> * click "Edit virtual machine settings"
> * go to tab named "options"
> * click Shared Folders
> * selected ENABLED
> * bottom-right, click ADD
> * select a directory on your host's filesystem
> * think of a name you'd like to show this directory as to guest

Well, that's in the VMware Player manual ;-)


> Couldn't find a list of errorlevels either.
> 0 seems to be Succes (and/or help screen)
> 4 seems to be Shared Folders feature not enabled at all
> 5 seems to be Invalid Syntax (VMSMOUNT X: --> VMSMOUNT /L:X)
> 6 seems to be Already Loaded
>
> Probably some errorlevels as well for:
> * no vmware
> * wrong dos

Now documented in the README


>> * Free (GPL)
>
> SHSUCDX might not be opensource despite having sources, so hope it
> served as inspiration only. Getting tricky otherwise.

There's absolutely no code from SHSUCDX in there. I just used it as
another reference to understand how a redirector works in some obscure
cases.


> What might be usefull, just as in SHSUCDX and some other applications
> nowadays, is to return errorlevels based on assigned driveletter
> (A=1, Z=26) with generic errors having an errorlevel above that (250+
> seems popular somehow) and a helpscreen having errorlevel 0.
>
> Benefit of that is being able to detect the assigned driveletter in a
> batchfile.

Done.

>> * Complete, read-write implementation
>
> Awesome. How are files beyond filesystem limitations handled? 2GB+ files
> shared through host to a non-FAT32 kernel for example. Or 4GB+ shared to
> a FAT32 DOS guest.

Only first 2GB are accesible.

>> * Unicode - DOS codepage translation for filenames
>> * Fully localized with Kitten (currently English and Spanish,
>> translations are welcome)
>
> couldn't find an external language file to translate. Are external files
> supported at runtime (kitten) or compile-time only? Or maybe even both
> as MEM once had, implemented by David o' Shea.

External files are supported at runtime. They are only needed during
driver initialisation.

I'm sorry, I didn't realized that I only provided the Spanish catalog.
English messages are the default and hardcoded. I'm providing an
English catalog now and including the Dutch translation you've sent
me, thanks!

> I haven't looked at sourcecode, nor do I know how to properly interpret
> it, but guessing something like this happens:
> [1] check if current operating system is supported
> [2] check if Shared Folders ability is exposed (thus running under
> supported version of VMware)
> [3] Assign driveletter if [3] succeeded
> [4] Attach all Shared Folders share names as folders under this
> driveletter. Funny if Sharing enabled but 0 shares enabled.
> [5] Exit succesfully

Yep, correct :)

> I'm not fully aware of how flexible these shared folders are, have
> almost never used them. If it's one-time only mapping (without removing,
> modifying and attaching again) I guess it might work like this:
>
> A) No Shared Folders ability: do nothing
> B) Shared Folders ability, but no shares enabled: do nothing
> C) 1 Shared Folder: mount share name as the drive, instead of as a
> folder under it.
> D) 2 or more shared folders: assign driveletter, mount shares under it.
>    (or each share its own driveletter, depending on your design decisions)
> E) exit with errorlevel corresponding to driveletter
>
> Basically I dislike typing a share's name when looking for files.

This is how it works in any other OS. In Linux, all shares are mounted
under the same mount point and in Windows under the same letter.

I think it is a VMware's design feature. The idea is that, when the
player detects that the guest additions are installed, you can add,
remove, enable or disable shares when the machine is running and this
is much easier if all shares are under a single mount point.

This is not the case with vmsmount because I'm yet to find how to
register with the virtual machine as a guest addition and you need to
power off the VM to modify the shared folders configuration, but this
will change eventually.


> Even DOS device names exist, unlike most installable file drivers /
> redirectors / TSRs.
> (IF EXIST X:\NUL echo YES)

I'm not sure if this is a feature or a bug :P I'll look into it.

> hope my (extensive) feedback is usefull.

A lot, thank you!!

Eduardo.

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