OVERVIEW -------- UZfulnix is a subset of useful Unix(TM) utilities for PCs running MS-DOS 3.x and later. This toolset is really intended for the hard-core Unix user, although certain programs are worth looking into by the DOS- oriented, specially if they do not modify files (eg. df, du, more, tail, which). The toolset is designed to complement the GNUish MS-DOS tools (although there is some overlap). The current release contains the following utilities: basename, cal, cat, cmp, date, dd, df, du, find, more, mv, od, pwd, rm, sleep, strings, sum, tail, tee, time, touch, uudecode, uuencode, wc, which. INSTALLATION ------------ The simplest alternative to install UZfulnix is to follow these instructions: 1) Make a separate directory (using mkdir from the DOS prompt) and copy the files from your distribution medium (either extract it from a downloaded archive file (PKZIP, LHARC, ZOO, ...), or copy from the diskette) into that directory. It is highly recommended to install into a newly created directory, so that you can easily upgrade or uninstall later. 2) Edit the file C:\AUTOEXEC.BAT to add the directory which contains the UZfulnix executables to the PATH variable. The order of the directories in the PATH variable matters, and we recommend to put the UZfulnix directory at the beginning of the list (specially before the DOS directory!). 3) Reboot the computer. You are ready to use the UZfulnix utilities. To uninstall UZBlank in the event you are not going to use it, simply reverse the steps above, that is: 1) Remove the directory from the PATH variable. 2) Remove the executables. USAGE ----- The utilities are designed to emulate the original Unix functionality (in particular, the SunOS 4.1.3 variant) as closely as possible. For this reason, if you have access to the Unix manual pages, they will provide the most complete documentation. Alternatively, any book on Unix utilities will show you sample usage of most of them. Since they are well documented in other places, we present here only a brief description of each program: basename - print base file name of a pathname This command is often used in shell scripts. For example: $ for file in rcs/*.* do rcs -nversion1: `basename $file` done NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE cal - print calendar NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE cat - concatenate files No command line options implemented. Can be used to concatenate two or more files, such as C:\> cat a b c > d NOTE: this command only modifies files if you redirect the output (eg. with the > construct). DOS equivalents: type cmp - binary compare 2 files NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: fc /b date - print current date and time Supports most of the System V output formats. Does not set time (yet). NOTE: Since COMMAND.COM also has a built-in 'date' command, you have to rename or copy this command to something like 'udate'. NOTE: this command does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: date, time dd - copy data in a variety of formats and sizes All the useful options are implemented: if=name Input file name. The standard input is the default. of=name Output file name. The standard output is the default. ibs=n Input block size, n bytes. The default is 512 bytes. obs=n Output block size, n bytes. The default is 512 bytes. bs=n Set both input and output block size to n bytes. skip=n Skip n input records before starting to copy. seek=n Seek n records from beginning of output file before copying. count=n Copy only n input records. This command is most useful to split a large file into multiple smaller pieces, eg. C:\> dd if=foo of=a:bar bs=50k count=28 will copy the first 1.4MB of the file foo to the file bar on floppy drive a:. NOTE: this command DOES modify files, so be careful. DOS equivalents: NONE df - display free disk drive space Displays used and available disk space of disk partitions. By default, displays information for the hard-disk partitions. With arguments, you can get information for floppies. C:\> df Drive Total Used Available kbytes kbytes kbytes -------------------------------- C: 204436 183668 20768 C:\> df a: Drive Total Used Available kbytes kbytes kbytes -------------------------------- A: 1423 323 1100 NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: dir (incomplete) du - print disk usage of files and directories This command displays disk space used by files and directories. For a directory, it displays the space used by all the files underneath. This command is most useful with the -s switch, to determine whether you can fit a subdirectory onto a floppy without compression. NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE find - find files Finds files that match certain criteria, then either displays them or executes a command on them. All useful options are implemented: -name expr match files by name -type file-type match files by type -mtime time-expr match files by modification time -print print matching files -exec expr execute a command for each matching file Here are some examples: C:\> find . -name a*.exe -print displays all executable files that start with 'a' in all directories on the C: drive, while C:\> find windows -name *.ini -exec grep load NUL {} \; executes the 'grep' command to find the string 'foo' in all Windows INI files (the NUL argument makes grep display the filename for any matching strings as well). NOTE: this command does not modify any files except possibly with the -exec option. DOS equivalents: NONE more - page a file This version of 'more' blows away the MS-DOS excuse of a file pager. Most of the features of the SunOS 'more' have been implemented, including backward scroll with 'b', string search with '/', editor invocation with 'v', skip file with ':n', etc. '?' will give you the help message. NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: more mv - move one or more files Moves files, even between disk partitions. Does not move directories (yet). NOTE: this command DOES modify files. DOS equivalents: ren od - octal dump Only the -x option is implemented. NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: debug pwd - present working directory NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE rm - remove one or more files The -r, -f and -i options have been implemented. NOTE: this command is the most dangerous of the entire toolset, thus has been disabled. You will have to explicitely rename the file from RM.DIS to RM.EXE to enable this command. We recommend using it only if you fully know its behaviour. See also the 'LIMITATIONS' section below. DOS equivalents: del, deltree sleep - sleep for a specified period of time This command is most often used in scripts, if you want to wait for a certain amount of time. NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE strings - find printable strings in one or more files NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE sum - checksum one or more files NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE tail - view the end of a file The -f option is implemented. NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE tee - output to a file and stdout NOTE: this command DOES modify files. DOS equivalents: NONE time - give execution time of a command NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE touch - touch one or more files This command is used to update file modification timestamps. NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any file contents. DOS equivalents: NONE uuencode/uudecode - encode/decode a uuencoded file The uuencode/uudecode utilities are used to encode binary data for transmission over 7-bit channels, such as most of the currently deployed e-mail protocols. The utilities in this toolset are compatible with the Unix counterparts, although there will be warning messages displayed (which you can ignore). To encode a binary file (eg. FILE.BIN), just say C:\ uuencode FILE.BIN FILE.BIN and it creates a file called FILE.UUE, which contains the encoded contents of FILE.BIN. The file FILE.UUE can be included in e-mail messages, and decoded by the recipient. To decode a uuencoded file, just say C:\ uudecode FILE.UUE and the original file is extracted. The filename of the original file is contained in the "begin" line at the beginning of the uuencoded file. wc - count words and lines in one or more files NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE which - print path for an executable NOTE: this command by itself does not modify any files. DOS equivalents: NONE LIMITATIONS ----------- Due to "features" of the DOS environment, the programs have the following limitations: - only DOS filename wildcards are supported. Be specially careful with the 'rm' command, since *a.* does not expand in DOS to what you think it should! This will be fixed in a future release. - these tools override the default MS-DOS error handler to work correctly in a MS-DOS window under MS-Windows, ie. they will not go into full-screen mode on I/O error. SUPPORT ------- If you are a registered user, UZful Software provides on-line support via e-mail at uzful@mv.mv.com . When you report a problem, please include - the version of the UZfulnix utility, - the type of PC you have, and - the symptoms of the problem (any special circumstances that make the problem appear? Can you repeat the problem?). The more info you provide, the quicker we can fix the problem. If you have additional suggestions on how to make the product even more useful, please drop us a line. UZful Software "We make the useful simple."