Looking for overview of libhxc API

[snhirsch]

I'm interested in coding support for hard-sector diskette formats and have been pointed to libhxcfe as being the place to start. Unfortunately, the semantics for the various exported functions are not clear to me, nor is it clear exactly what high-level function libhxcfe fulfills in the large. Is it intended as a codec between various captured disk formats and the HFE standard? If so, where can I find the definition of the HFE format?

Then there's the question of what the source format might be. I have various types of hardware to read, e.g. Heath H89 and Northstar diskettes, but these persist into simple sector-data images. If I understood more about what the emulator needed to see in order to present something that "looks" like a hard-sector disk I could certainly work out how to encode these.

Getting a starting point looks very challenging at this point. ANY hints, handwaving or pointers to concrete code that may be somewhat similar to what I'd need will be greatly appreciated. I am NOT a newbie, I have many years of coding background in everything from Z80 and 6502 assembler through C++ and Java. I am comfortable with low-level concepts, MFM encoding scheme, etc, etc. All i need is a bit of context for this task. There is a perfectly enormous body of code in the repository with no 10,000 ft. view of what it all does and how it fits together (that I could find, at any rate).

Thanks.

[Jeff]

Is there any documentation somewhere about this wanted sector format ?

[snhirsch]

Is there any documentation somewhere about this wanted sector format ?

I responded elsewhere, but yes I will either post here or make available to you on Dropbox. At work right now, will do this later today or tomorrow.