DiskDoubler

Article summary

DiskDoubler (DD) is a disk compression utility for classic Mac OS. Unlike a file compression utility that compresses files, directories and directory trees into a single archive file via user interaction, DiskDoubler compresses and decompresses files automatically, without user interaction. When an application reads a compressed file, DiskDoubler decompresses the data before providing it to the application. A later addition, AutoDoubler, adds background compression, compressing uncompressed files while the computer is otherwise idle. DiskDoubler was created by Terry Morse and Lloyd Chambers, fellow employees at a small software firm that went out of business in 1989. Chambers had already released a version of the Unix Compress utility on the Mac as MacCompress. While working on another "real" project, Chambers wrote DiskDoubler in his spare time. When demonstrating their new product at a local Mac store, they noticed that it was DiskDoubler that got all of the attention. It was first shown publicly at the San Francisco MacWorld Expo in April 1990 (normally in January, but delayed that year) and by the end of the show had sold 500 copies. By the summer they were selling 1000 copies a month. Realizing they needed real marketing muscle, they approached Symantec, who agreed to include it in their Symantec Utilities for Macintosh (SUM) package for a pittance.…

Key claims

No claims recorded.

Discussion questions

1. Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
2. Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
3. If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?

Bibliography

No sources recorded.