Public Domain Libraries

[MagikGimp]

Hi all,
I'm currently going through my old floppy discs and imaging what I have. What I'm wondering is does anyone know of anywhere that hosts images of Public Domain library discs. I never borrowed from them myself although I did read a lot about them in the Atari magazines I bought back then. The thing is I think I have copies of these discs and I want to cross-reference them against the originals. In the UK specifically I seem to remember names such as the ST Club (Nottingham?) and I have a disc whose volume label is STUKPDSW. I've searched around a bit but haven't found anything much; I would have thought that the owners of the libraries would still have all their old discs and whole have imaged them up for the public by now but I guess they're not aware that that could be possible?
I'd be very grateful for any help and advice,
John.

[Dal]

Personally I have yet to come across any completely 'digitally preserved' PD collection. Most of the stuff you could get from PD libraries now exist as individual Apps/Games/Demos etc etc.

Can anyone else help here?!?

[Dal]

Personally I have yet to come across any completely 'digitally preserved' PD collection. Most of the stuff you could get from PD libraries now exist as individual Apps/Games/Demos etc etc.

Can anyone else help here?!?

....Hold that thought - I think I've found a DVD lurking here but I can't check what's on it right now....

[Mug UK]

ST Club released their entire library on a few CDs along with the Floppyshop collection - bought the lot back in 1999. However, only Page 6 fansite seems to have done anything similar and that was only fairly recently.

[Dal]

OOOOO! I have the following PD collections (that I didn't know I had!)

4U (88 Disks)
ACN (79 Disks)
Atari Inside (102 Disks)
Atari Journal (342 Disks)
Atari Magazin (117 Disks)
Bitz Computers (5 Disks)
Budgie UK (284 Disks)
Cobra (99 Disks)
Delta Labs (227 Disks)
Diverse (134 Disks)
FaST Club (859 Disks)
FloppyShop (2855 Disks) + all the FloppyShop Gold CD's
GFA Club (190 Disks)
Heim Special Line (87 Disks)
Kontrast (47 Disks)
Poolware (568 Disks)
ST Computer (886 Disks)
ST Vision (470 Disks)
XeST (326 Disks)

Note these are all disk images and I have not indexed any of these yet so haven't got a clue what's on each one....

[Mug UK]

Some rare collections in there (I think) - interested to see what's in the GFA club

[Dal]

Some rare collections in there (I think) - interested to see what's in the GFA club

The pain is that there was no TOC included with the archives so I'll have to do it all by hand (probably have to set up my old server and bespoke software to get it done quickly)...

I'll make the GFA club first on the list and post the list up. It's not getting done anytime real soon though as other commitments have cropped up (as you well know!)

[Mug UK]

At the speed I generally work at .. it's usually a few months from project start to project finish

[keili]

The content of some of the series are known and included in the disk image list of Steem. I have lists with detailed descriptions, which i have used. If you want them, let me know.
Before you start to check every disk, take a look at the list. Maybe you can fill some of the holes first. BTW, the content of Poolware 2331-2560 is not yet included, but i also have a list.

[Dal]

The content of some of the series are known and included in the disk image list of Steem. I have lists with detailed descriptions, which i have used. If you want them, let me know.
Before you start to check every disk, take a look at the list. Maybe you can fill some of the holes first. BTW, the content of Poolware 2331-2560 is not yet included, but i also have a list.

Thank you very much Keili - will certainly save a lot of work!

[MagikGimp]

Wow, what a fruitful thread already! I've seen Page 6's site but they're not a library I'm familiar with; I do however have six of the CDs that are sold at LGD and thinking about it now I have a feeling that there are some PD disc images on those somewhere (so thanks for the reminder). Thanks also for the attachment and the info about STEem which I should have thought of myself. I'll have to go through my old ST Formats sometime too as they ran reviews on PD discs which might be worth reading and possibly scanning. Talk about projects eh, what have I started?

[MagikGimp]

I'm in the process of building a small web-page with downloads for the PD discs I have but I see no point in doing this unless the information I'm gathering can be used in a better way and hopefully eventually with other people's contributions. What I need is some Atari (or PC but I think it unlikely) software that can list the contents i.e. files and folders contained on each disc. From that data it can immediately be seen what is on which disc and that information could then possibly be implemented in a database, search or whatever. My aim is to have links to the disc images and text files of the directory listings, the different version numbers of each programme I could also show. At this current stage I'm not technically proficient to make any thing more than that. I'd appreciate any help with this matter as I haven't been able to find anything of any use myself.

[MagikGimp]

One of my disks has its desktop file set up so the label of the trash-can is SWSL. Anyone heard of this group and know what the acronym stands for?

[Pastor]

Hi Dal_1978

What is the name of the DVD that has all the PD libraries on it? Where did you get it?

Thanks

Paul

[Dal]

Hi Dal_1978

What is the name of the DVD that has all the PD libraries on it? Where did you get it?

Thanks

Paul

It was on e-bay as a 6DVD set. Was a little dubious but for £15 or whatever it was I thought "what the hell!". Arrived in a couple of days in a hard plastic 6 leaf case - quite well presented.
Usual suspects were there obviously, but came across a few gems that filled holes here and there as well as the mentioned PD libraries. In the end a worthy investment.

For the cost of the blank DVD's and some postage, I can send some/all of it over to you if you like?

[Mug UK]

One of my disks has its desktop file set up so the label of the trash-can is SWSL. Anyone heard of this group and know what the acronym stands for?

South West Software Library

[8bitguy1]

OOOOO! I have the following PD collections (that I didn't know I had!)

4U (88 Disks)
ACN (79 Disks)
Atari Inside (102 Disks)
Atari Journal (342 Disks)
Atari Magazin (117 Disks)
Bitz Computers (5 Disks)
Budgie UK (284 Disks)
Cobra (99 Disks)
Delta Labs (227 Disks)
Diverse (134 Disks)
FaST Club (859 Disks)
FloppyShop (2855 Disks) + all the FloppyShop Gold CD's
GFA Club (190 Disks)
Heim Special Line (87 Disks)
Kontrast (47 Disks)
Poolware (568 Disks)
ST Computer (886 Disks)
ST Vision (470 Disks)
XeST (326 Disks)

Note these are all disk images and I have not indexed any of these yet so haven't got a clue what's on each one....

Did all of this ever get uploaded anywhere or shared? Seems like an awesome treasure....

[rudis]

there are some http://downloads.atari-home.de/Public_Domain/

[8bitguy1]

That will keep me busy for a while, thank you!

[Wiking67]

anyone having AM_062.zip full?