safecopy Files

Release Notes:

Safecopy now features a benchmark suite, ready to test run data recovery tools
in a controlled environment. It is implemented using a wrapper library for
glibc, simulating a virtual file which mimics device characteristics for any
(damaged) media of choice, including:
- simulation of damaged and unreadable sectors
- simulation of recoverable sectors (sectors that fail reading on first attempt
  but do succeed on repeated retry)
- realistic timing behaviour during read attempts and seeking on both intact
  and damaged sectors.
- simulation of firmware level error correction and other hardware behaviour,
  manifesting itself in increased response times for some sectors.
- Sample characteristics to simulate a small selection of damaged media.
The safecopy main program has been enhanced to be able to read from /dev/raw
devices or open files with O_DIRECT if requested. New command line switches
generate debug output and collect statistic information on damaged devices.

Change Log:

2009.07.18
- Support for synchronous direct IO via O_DIRECT added.
- Improved the test debug library to simulate delays and timeouts.

2009.07.28
- Added documentation for simulation benchmark creation.
- Moved test library in source tree and renamed to "simulator".
- Added benchmarking subproject.