Ref: 03050020
Title: Using SPLITBIN (OS/2 Version) to Split Up Large Archive Files
Date:  5/10/91

Copyright 3Com Corporation, 1991.  All rights reserved.

When using OS/2 utilities such as PKZIP2 to compress and archive
applications and directories, it is easy to generate an archive file
several megabytes in size, making it difficult to store the archive
file onto diskette for backup.  The program SPLITBIN.EXE, for use in the
OS/2 protected-mode environment, can simplify this process.  Create your
archive file in the usual way, then use SPLITBIN to break up the archive
file into diskette-sized pieces that can be individually copied to
diskette.

SPLITBIN is located in the Ask3Com forum, Unsupported Utilities library, in
the file SPLIT2.ZIP.


To use SPLITBIN, determine the capacity of your diskette in bytes (running
CHKDSK A: is a good way to do this), and save this figure for later
reference.  After your archive file has been produced, run SPLITBIN, passing
it the diskette size and archive filename (and possibly an optional third
parameter indicating an output drive and path on which to place the split
files).  For example, if your archive file is ARCHIVE.ZIP, and your archive
is to be stored on double-density 5-1/4" (360K) floppies, run SPLITBIN with a
command like this:

        SPLITBIN 362496 ARCHIVE.ZIP

SPLITBIN will then generate several 362,496-byte output files (depending
on how large the input file is) with names ARCHIVE.000, ARCHIVE.001, etc.,
each file the proper size to fit on your diskettes.

Note:  You may run SPLITBIN without any parameters to produce a help message.

To combine the "split" files into a single archive once again, so files
can be extracted from the archive, use a JOINBIN utility, if available, or
use the OS/2 COPY command:

        COPY /B file.000+file.001[+file.002+...] file.ZIP

For example, if splitting up ARCHIVE.ZIP produced three "split" files,
the proper COPY command to recombine them again would be as follows:

        COPY /B ARCHIVE.000+ARCHIVE.001+ARCHIVE.002 ARCHIVE.ZIP

Use the /B (binary) switch with COPY, because COPY defaults to ASCII mode
when concatenating.  If you do not use the /B switch, COPY will terminate
after the first Ctrl-Z in each file.

