Is Disc Spanning Finally Clever?

[MartinC]

I already read that disc spanning is supposed to be unchanged (against Toast 9), so my hope that it finally got a bit more "clever" is very very low... however, I just thought I ask again.

 

This is the problem ("don't split files" always turned on):

 

In Toast 9 disc spanning just works through the file list (alphabetically) and once a file doesn't fit on the recent CD anymore, it starts the next one.

 

Let's say we have three files (CD size = 700 MB):

 

aaa.zip (400 MB)

bbb.zip (600 MB)

ccc.zip (200 MB)

 

Then Toast 9 will initially show "1200 MB, will fit on 2 CDs" but then spans it to 3 (!) CDs: It starts with aaa.zip, bbb.zip doesn't fit = CD1. Then it takes bbb.zip, ccc.zip doesn't fit = CD2. Finally ccc.zip = CD3.

 

Pardon me, but this is very very stupid. Before you argue - I am aware that "packaging problems" are among the most complex (and even partially unsolved) algorithms in computer science, but I am not asking for any (theoretical) *perfect* solution, I'm just asking for a *decent* solution, and every little kid can figure out how this problem (above) can be improved.

 

This is the (very simple) algorithm:

- once a file doesn't fit on the recent CD, just process down on the alphetical list until the next file fits!!!

 

In our example this means: It starts with aaa.zip, bbb.zip doesn't fit - so try ccc.zip next (it fits), end of file list reached = CD1. Then it takes bbb.zip (end of file list) = CD2. Hurray!

 

For a developer it takes 5 minutes to implement this algorithm and hardly 20 minutes to test it afterwards - and this will *dramatically* improve your software.

 

For a couple of upgrades Toast was adding more and more gimmicks and odd "features" that have *nothing* to do with burning discs - like streaming videos, etc. pp.

 

If you have nothing left to improve, then fine (just add online gaming as well, if you want), but as long as Toast is lacking basic improvements with handling the most core functions (like handling files for burning data discs in a clever way), why don't you just concentrate on your basic functonality and only start adding gimmicks once Toast really works fine on its original playground?

 

I was buying all Toast versions/upgrades since Toast 3, but I will now stick with Toast 9 until a new version comes out, that will provide essential improvements on the functions that I originally bought Toast 3 for...