This will do it:
#!/bin/bash

for i in `cat ${1}`
do echo -ne ${i:0:1}
if [[ ${i: -1} = "." ]]
then echo .
fi
done

Ah, that makes sense. I thought I might have screwed something up. I compiled up the 2.0 version as well with no success.

It would be nice to get it all running ok. I'll look into the other TODOs...

Good job!
But - have anyone got hamster/ferret working properly on 64-bit? For me, ferret segfaults after a few seconds with "unknown record type", and hamster keeps complaining "hamster.txt:...