Disc drive names
Each disc drive used by your Amiga is identified by a simple three-character code, followed by
he colon character to distinguish the name of the drive from a file name. The internal floppy
disc drive is referred to like this:
Df0:
If you have installed additional floppy drives, they will be named Df1: then Df2: and so on. I lard drives are identified by a similar code, with the first hard disc drive carrying a zero, the second a one, and so on, like this:
Dh0:
Volume names
The Amiga is happy to refer to an individual disc by name instead of looking for the disc drive
code, as long as the string of characters that make up the name of the disc carries the colon
character, as follows:
AMOS_PROFESSIONAL:The titles of "discs are known as "volume" names, which is the equivalent of the title of a written volume in a library. AMOS Professional automatically checks each available drive for the required disc, and if it cannot be found, the "Device not available" error will be given.
Whenever a new disc is prepared for use via the Workbench, it is automatically given the name "Empty", waiting for you to re-name it with a suitable volume title, after clicking on the I Rename] option. It is very bad practice to give the same name to more than one disc, as both the Amiga and its operator can get confused by sloppy naming. If different discs do have the same volume name for any reason, you will have to refer to the appropriate drive name to tell AMOS Professional precisely which of these discs you are interested in. For example:
X> Dir "Df0:"
The DIR command is used to print out a directory index of a disc, and is explained below.
Files and directories
If you think of a disc as a self-contained "volume" , then that volume can contain one or more
"folders" of information, and each folder can hold all sorts of "files". Before any file can be
accessed and used, it has to be found in the file directory of its disc. The next section of this
Chapter explains how files are managed with AMOS Professional, but first you should be aware
of the set of objects known as "logical devices".
Logical devices are used by the Amiga's operating routines to work out the exact position of important system files, such as the fonts used for text characters and the device handlers used for peripherals. Each device is normally assigned to a specific directory on the current start-up disc.