Bookreader error on WinXP with BKB file from 1995

[Verne Britton]

when I try to open a BKB file from 1995 (actually the CONSOLE.DECW$BOOK file renamed to console.bkb and FTPed in binary down to my PC), I get the error

Page type is 453, should be 1

my version of the BNU windows program is

Beta v1.2

dated 31-Jul-2001 ...

which calls the windows program

bookreader.exe

(dated 6-Sep-2000) which does execute and then gives me the above error when opening the file.

Other BKB files from older CDroms (where I got these windows utilities) do open OK ...
(had to build my own bookshelf.odl file to feed to BNU ... is it possible to mess that up)

any ideas ?

p.s. the CONSOLE.DECW$BOOK file opens just fine on Alpha OpenVMS v8.2 with BookReader :-)


Verne

[John Gillings]

Verne,

I suspect you'll need to take this up with HP customer support to get anywhere, but given the dates, the product involved (isn't that one that got sold?), and the nature of the data files (obsolete format), I think I know what their answer might be... :-(

[Wim Van den Wyngaert]

Or use http://www.sysworks.com.au/odl.html

Wim

[Verne Britton]

Found two solutions, plus I did open a support call and then shared my solution with them :-)

The bottom line is, the Windows version of Bookreader actually does want the variable format (RMS) file structure that VMS uses !!

With help, I found two ways to do this:

1. when moving the *.decw$book files to the PC, inside your FTP client do

put/fdl xx.decw$book

and then ignore (delete) the FDL temp file created on the PC (the "main" file will be in the proper format).

OR
2. "convert" the file first on VMS:

a. copy xx.decw$book xx.dat
b. set file/attr=(RFM:FIX,RAT:NONE,LRL:512) xx.dat
c. FTP the XX.DAT file in binary mode to the PC
d. rename XX.DAT on the PC to either xx.decw$book or xx.bkb

----------------------

Once the file containing the two byte RMS variable record header bits is on the PC, run BNU, then get BOOKREADER up (by navigating to an existing BKB file on some bookshelf) then use the FILE--OPEN dialog to read your new file (if things got installed properly, you can double-click on the BKB file and BOOKREADER will be launched).

Of course you can also create your own bookshelf and other BNU files to make access easier.

I was shocked to find out (using a hex dump PC utility) that the PC files that worked fine with BOOKREADER had the RMS bytes at the beginning of each record !!

Now I can read all my decw$book files on my laptop.


Verne