Public (software) Library Programming Library Descriptions and Compilation Copyright 1993 Nelson Ford Duplication, reprinting and distribution of these descriptions is restricted. See LICENSE.DOC in the PSL_NEWS directory for complete information =====General Programming Tools and Info, part 1 CONTENTS: -----INFO_REF: information, reference, tutorials -----VER_TRAK: version tracking & control -----PGM_BIZ: business tools for programmers -----TOOLS (The following sections are in TOOLS2.TXT) -----PGM_ENV: programming environments -----MULTLANG: libraries and routines for multiple languages -----DEBUG -----CALC -----HEX_EDIT: Hex viewers and editors -----SOUND -----INSTALL: installation programs -----DATABASE -----FLOWCHRT: case and program flow charting programs -----DEMOMAKR: demo makers ================================================= -----INFO_REF: information, reference, tutorials [GUIDE] Shareware Programmer's Guide (Ford, Nelson & ASP, $0) is an extensive guide to marketing your software as shareware. Includes advice on all areas of program design, documentation, and marketings, as well as many sources of supplies from credit card processing to shrink wrap machines. [ATEASE1, ATEASE2] At Ease With Computer Programming 1.4 (Synfonics ASP; $54) is a programming tutor designed to make you think like a computer. It covers Creative Problem Solving, Writing Solutions, and Translating Into Code. This lesson is also divided into five sub-courses including Thinking, Defining, Modeling, Formulating, and Computing. It teaches you how to analyze problems and write solutions. Requires 512K and CGA, EGA, or VGA. [DOSRef] DOSRef (Williams, Dave; $20) is a programmer's reference to complete register-level information on all documented and most undocumented DOS and BIOS calls. [HelpPC] HelpPC (Jurgens, David; $25-$30) is a collection of public domain technical articles, lists and excerpts from several common reference manuals all organized in a single database. The help topics include BIOS interrupts, DOS interrupts, BIOS data areas, DOS data structures, and Standard C functions. The main program is a quick reference utility which allows viewing of the help database from the DOS command line. You'll find the screen displays are brief and to the point. This program is designed for the PC programmer who knows what he's doing, but just can't remember the syntax, or parameters to some little used BIOS interrupt, DOS data structure or C function. Over 900 technical topics have been covered. Other features include a file indexer, and partial pattern matching for topic searches. [INT36A, INT36B, INT36C, INT36D] MSDOS Interrupt List 3.6 (Brown, Ralf; $0) is a comprehensive listing of functions available through interrupt calls, both documented and undocumented. [INTVDB] INTVDB is a part of MSDOS Interrupt List set. [DVIN36] DV Interrupt 3.6 (Ralf Brown; $0) is an extract of the MSDOS Interrupt List containing the DESQview and QEMM API calls. [DVIN36] [VI_SOFT] VI_Soft (Vanderheiden, Gregg C. Ph.D.; $0) is a discussion about developing software that is more accessible for visually impaired. [COREF] Charts of Reference 1.1 (RaLin Enterprises; $7) is a reference utility for programmers. Charts include eight different charts, ASCII text color codes, ANSI Esc codes, color attribute numbers, extended key codes, and character codes. [21HELP] 21Help (Kaye, Bob; $?) is sort of a poor man's Norton Guide describing each INT 21H function, the other DOS interrupts and the ROM BIOS interrupts. There is a small resident portion (2.2K) which reads three text files from disk and displays the selected information. Requires EGA/VGA. [BIOS13] BIOS13 (Martin, Charley; $0) is a discussion of poorly documented quirks of the BIOS diskette services. [DEBUG7] DEBUG7 is a tutorial made to present an overview of the DEBUG.COM program for the PC [HEADER] Header (Yoshizaki, Haruyasu; $0) describes the header format for LHArc. [COPR] How To Copyright Software 92 (Locus Incorporated; $13) contains a discussion of copyright law and step-by-step instructions from a programmer/attorney on how to apply for a Certificate of Copyright Registration of computer software and documentation. [INTPROT] IntProt (Dunford, Christopher J.; $0) descibes IBM's not-well-known protocol for interrupt sharing. [HiMem] HiMem 2.06 (Microsoft Corporation; $0) defines the Extended Memory Specification (XMS) version 2.00 for MS-DOS. XMS allows DOS programs to utilize additional memory found in Intel's 80286 and 80386 based machines in a consistent, machine independent manner. [TSR] TSR.TXT (Vitt, Mark; $0) is a discussion of new interrupts that should be hooked in order to create stable TSRs. [HelpPC] HelpPC (Jurgens, David; $25) is a collection of public domain technical articles, lists and excerpts from several common reference manuals all organized in a single database. The help topics include BIOS interrupts, DOS interrupts, BIOS data areas, DOS data structures, and Standard C functions. The main program is a quick reference utility which allows viewing of the help database from the DOS command line. You'll find the screen displays are brief and to the point. This program is designed for the PC programmer who knows what he's doing, but just can't remember the syntax, or parameters to some little used BIOS interrupt, DOS data structure or C function. Over 900 technical topics have been covered. Other features include a file indexer, partial pattern matching for topic searches, a TSR version, hypertext linking, and more. [GAME_PGM] Game-Pgm (Gellman, Robert; $0) is an essay of the author's own views on the programming of games. Mr. Gellman has programmed several games and registered a number of others. This file contains his views on good and bad features in shareware and other games and some pointers on how to make a good, quality game with a reasonable price. [LICADD] LicAdd (Unique Software ASP; $15) is a set of programs primarily for shareware programmers: LICENSE 1.1 prompts the user for his name and address and prints a customized registration form. The user then only has to include a check, fold the form, add a stamp and mail. No envelopes are needed. ADDRESS is similar, except it lets registered users easily report a change of address. [RAT_EW] Rat 2.40 (Wooten, Emery; $5) is a 5k pop-up that displays the ASCII character set. [BOOKS] Software Engineering Book List (Cohen, Richard; $0) is a reading list that was originally developed in 1986 for a college course in structured analysis. It has since been revised and expanded a number of times to support a variety of courses, both college and industrial, in software engineering. These books should be of considerable interest to anyone developing business oriented information systems. [UPD386] UPD386 (Norton, Daniel A.; $0) is a summary that describes the differences between the instructions of the Intel 80286 and 80386 processors. It discusses the 32-bit register, the new addressing modes, debug registers, and paging. It also describes each new instruction, along with examples. It is primarily intended for programmers who are already familiar with the 80286 instruction set. [OPCODE] Opcode is a text file that contains Opcode tables through 80386. -----VER_TRAK: version tracking & control [AVTS13] ARIS Version Tracking System 1.3 (Riedel, Alexander; $30) is a control/configuration management system for software allowing you to keep track of the versions of source code modules and tracing the development of the program. [LDIFF1] LDiff .110 lets you create update files which can be distributed to your program users for updating their old program files. LDiff automatically compares your new EXE with the old EXE and creates a difference file. The difference file and a small LDiff utility can be given to users. The utility will automatically update their EXE files. This can be cheaper and easier than sending all-new files. [MERGEBG] Merge (Ghodsi, Bob; $?) helps you create large single files from multiple source files.. These files can later be used for general reference purposes or cut and paste jobs during application development. [RCS56D] Revision Control System 5.6 (Frank Whaley) manages multiple revisions of files. RCS can store, retrieve, log, identify, and merge revisions. It is useful for files that are revised frequently, such as programs, documentation, graphics, and papers. [VCOMP] Visual Compare 1.52 (Whitney, John R. ASP; $33) is a file comparison utility. It is very fast, and the use of colors to differentiate the files' contents in a scrollable display makes it easy to see differences between files. Recommended in Dr. Dobb's Journal. Great for comparing program source files. [WSP] WSP 1.50 (Wada, Wakiti Koichi; $?) compares an old and updated file and creates a COM program which will make the changes to the user's old file. You can send the user just the COM file instead of a full set of new files. [CMP] CMP (Gersbach, Jack; $0) is a file comparison utility program that has the power to perceive added and deleted sections of a file as well as changes. [HDiff] HDiff 1.22 (Dunford, Christopher J.; $0) a fast text file comparator for OS/2, intended for programmers' use in source and version control. [Bled] Bled (Goosens, Ken; $0) allows different people to make changes to a text file that they jointly maintain. The typical use of BLED is for producing modifications to source code for programs. Interactive Microsoft BASIC has long had a MERGE command which functions like BLED. It inserts, deletes, and replaces lines based on line numbers. Other public domain programs would compare two BASIC programs and produce a merge file to convert one to the other using the merge command. BLED is a generalized program that combines these two functions and works for all languages, not just BASIC. A command line option lets you remove comments from code. The maximum number of metavariables is 99. The program supports metacommands with file includes, conditional logic, and in-line blocks. [SW_CC] Software Change Control (Erickson, Walter; $20-$129) compares two files and generates various reports that display any or all change differences. It records who, why, when, and where changes were made, maintaining a complete history of all changes. It can help eliminate undetected programming errors, and track coding progress on software projects. [SYSTRAK] SYSTRAK (Plossl, Keith R.; $?) tracks revisions to source code files within multiple program systems. [PC_TAGS] PC-Tags (Moderne Software; $38-$73) is a DOS and OS/2 source-code retrieval system that will locate and retrieve a function or procedure definition from a text file written in C, Pascal, BASIC, dBASE, Assembly, Modula-2 or any other language (including English). After locating the source file, PC-TAGS will load it into your editor and place the cursor at the retrieved function or procedure's beginning. -----PGM_BIZ: business tools for programmers [SSS] Super Shareware System 1.0 (PractiComp; $65) tracks customers, prospects, distributors, contacts, products, sales, and exenses for shareware authors. You can do targeted mailings to customers, prospects, and distributors, printing postcards or labels. There are 24 reports available, some including contact listings and directories, geographic summaries for customers and distributors, a balance sheet, payments due and income over a specified time period with subtotals by day, month, or year. You can import data in dBASE, Delimited, or SDF formats. -----TOOLS [BETATST@] Beta Test Program 2.7 (MyLife Software, ASP; $24) helps software authors develop a beta test program. Suggestions and examples are provided for an effective beta tester. A beta test bug report generator is provided for easy isolation of troublesome bugs in beta software. [BULLET] Bullet 1.02 (Huth, Cornel; $80) is a library of data management modules that can be used with virtually any DOS-based compiler. It is written in assembler and uses high-speed b-tree index files and DBF data file format. Over 65 file functions are provided. Features include the ability to save binary data; support for character keys up to 64 bytes as well as 16-/32-bit integer keys, signed or unsigned; error recovery; low-level direct DOS file I/O; high-level transaction-based accesses for network control; National Language Support; and more. [CPRN_CS] CPrint 2.17 (Cactus Software; $20) prints source code for most languages on LaserJets with comments highlighted. [Libra] Libra 1.01 (Rose, Herb; $20) provides a useful, easy interface to Microsoft's LIB program for managing object libraries. This is a programmer productivity tool. It shows all the modules in a library, the EXTERNAL and PUBLIC symbols referenced by each module, and the module size. In addition to the normal LIB operations of ADD, DELETE, EXTRACT, and REPLACE modules, you can perform a search for modules that reference particular symbols. All this is done with an easy to use, windowed user interface. [NEWPROJ] NewProj (Andersen, Anthony; $0) automates the creation of OS/2 PM projects. It makes all files necessary to compile and run a program. It creates a main routine, window routine, and a dialog box routine. C, RC, DLG H, MAK, ICO, DEF, and LNK files are produced. Source is included. [QMAKE] QMake (Houston, Jerry; $0) is an intermediate step between Sammy Mitchell's excellent editor QEdit and the MAKE.EXE utility that's supplied by many manufacturers. It will allow you to press a key while editing a program source file, and automatically invoke your MAKE utility with that current filename (minus its extension) as the argument for MAKE. Source code included. [RTMEM] RunTime Memory 1.10 (Dunford, Christopher J.; $0) lets you test-run programs within a specified amount of DOS memory. [TexStat] TexStat 2.1 (Panther Associates; $5) will keep track of your programming progress by counting all characters, words, lines, periods, commas, semicolons, 'C' and Pascal comments. [Exe2Com] Exe2Com 1.05 (Dunford, Christopher J.; $0) is a replacement for Exe2Bin. It offers an optional display of the EXE file's relocation table, which can help if you get the relocatable items error when converting EXE to COM. Includes C source. [PcFmt] PcFmt 1.3 (Unique Software ASP; $15) formats your Aspect Source Files, accounting for all block structures, giving you evenly indented statements which are easier to read. [PGMTOOL] Programmers Toolbox 1.0 (Silicon Systems; $15) is a set of utilities that allow the programmer to analyze/edit files and/or memory in their base HEX form. DUMP, the file dump utility, displays files and memory in both HEX and ASCII formats and allows the user to save portions of the dump to a file. HEXEDIT, a Hexadecimal edit utility, allows the user to edit binary and ASCII files in a HEX mode. It uses basic editing features, ASCII/Binary Search, Scroll, Edit, etc. [SDT] Software Developers Toolkit 1.0 (Vic Williams, ASP; $0-$60) is a set of tools for software development. This toolkit provides a make with backup capability, a makefile builder, a tool to convert standard makefiles to Blinker/plink overlay format, a copy of awk, a basic installer/DOS menu program, and remote support software that you can distribute with your products. It provides development tools, installation capability, and ongoing support/maintenance functions including both user and developer backup capability. [UNST13] Universal Install 1.3 (The GoodSoft Co., ASP; $36)is a professional installation package. It can match the look and feel of your own software. It includes an undo installation feature, support for multi-disk copying, external programs, CONFIG and AUTOEXEC modifying, and more. [XMSTRIX] XmsTrix (Roy, Don; $0) contains assembler routines built around the Microsoft Extended Memory Specification (XMS), Version 2.0 for MS-DOS. At the minimum, you can add up to an extra 64K of executable code space for your programs. [XRay] XRay 1.5 (Kihlken, Tom; $15) is a memory resident program (8k) which provides either a detailed report or a summary of exactly which DOS function calls, including a number of undocumented DOS calls, your program is making. You can use it to determine what other programs are doing or to help debug your own programs. Also included is a high resolution timer which helps detect I/O bound code which can bog down even your tightest assembler program. [KEYS21] Keys 2.1 displays the scan values and ascii values of keys when pressed. [MAKE] Make executes commands in a "makefile" to update one or more target files. If no "-f" option is present, "MAKEFILE" is used as the makefile. [MemScan] MemScan (Martin, Charles F., ASP; $0) is a TSR memory scanner. It lets you scan RAM during program execution or it can be called in an Assembly program. It also shows contents of registers. [MovROM] MovROM copies the BIOS to RAM, makes it resident, and repoints all BIOS interrupts to the copied code, thus allowing any debugger operations to be preformed. MOVROM must be executed before any resident utilities are installed because such utilities repoint BIOS interrupts to themselves. When MOVROM exits, it displays the segment where it copied the ROM code; the offsets are the same as in the original BIOS listing. [NJSTACK] Nifty James' Stack Checker 1.00 (Blaszczak, Mike; $10) is a set of .OBJ files which contain a redefined version of Microsoft's _chkstk routine. [PCTrace] PCTrace implements a trace table for MS-DOS to allow you to see what DOS or BIOS functions a particular program uses. [PGMAID] Programmer's Aid (Richmond, J. P. Jr.; $10) is a resident utility that allows you to call up a table of ASCII characters at any time. [XRAY_JF] Xray (Ferguson, John F.; $?) allows you to monitor areas of your computer's memory while other programs are running. These other programs can be COMMAND.COM, for those interested in some aspect of that program; your own resident programs; or some .COM or .EXE application. XRAY gives you, on a real-time basis, the ability to watch memory variables or your stack change dynamically. [Flist] Flist 1.0 (Portz, Frederick F.; $0) will neatly format and list source code listings. [87ERROR] 87Error (Scott, Leland C.; $0) is a simple 8087 error interrupt handler. When an error interrupt is generated by the 8087 a letter in reverse video will appear in the upper right hand corner of the monochrome display. The letter will indicate the general type of error which caused the 8087 to generate an interrupt. [PROFILR] Profiler is a system of programs used to list where your code is spending its time. As an example, to run the system: run PROFILE CHKDSK.COM (a copy of which must be in your current dir). The batch file profile.bat will copy CHKDSK.COM to SUBJECT.COM, analyze where subject.com is spending time and list this for you. Subject.com will be deleted upon completion. [SHOWKEY] Showkey (Felt, Dave; $?) display ASCII and hex codes for a key. [ASCIIJP] ASCII 1.2 (Piepers, John; $0) displays the ASCII table in hex, octal, decimal and binary. It is not a TSR. [Dynagen] Dynagen (MyndTryx; $72-$82) will generate 27 different types of data in ASCII, dBASE, FoxPro, Paradox and other file formats for testing your software. [FileXRef] FileXRef (ConVal Software, Inc. ASP; $27) will scan all your application source and ASCII documentation files, producing cross reference report files, or data files. It can process all text files and has special processing logic for supporting the syntax of the following file types: BAS, BAT, C, H, CPP, HPP, COB, DOC, PRG, FOR, ASM, MAK, PAS, PLI, PRG, REX, SQL, INP, and TXT. All other types are scanned as if they were ASCII text files. [HDK90A, HDK90B] Help Development Kit 9.0 (Loewy, Ron; $40) creates help files for the Windows Help engine, DESQview/X, QuickHelp, THelp, TVHC, and PopHelp. This is a blessing for those unwilling to tackle the complexities of the Windows RTF formatting. It is a must-have for programmers working in multiple platforms. [MISCTOOL] Misc. Programming Tools (Vic Williams; $0) is a set of programmer's tools. Make is a program that will maintain, update, and reconstruct groups of programs and other software. Build makes conventional makefiles with a variety of options. To_ovl converts conventional Borland/Microsoft make linker files to Blinker/Plink overlay script files. SerNo helps add and read serial number information at the bottom of EXE and COM files. LS lists files with a variety of options. [OVL_MGRS] OVL (Devore, Michael E., ASP; $75) is a set of overlay managers, a linkable and a stand-alone version. OVL loads overlays from disk at the appropriate time and jumps program execution to the overlay code. OVL has only been tested with MASM, Turbo C, and QuickBASIC 4.00, but it is probable that OVL will work with all languages that compile to Microsoft Overlay LINKable object modules and which perform direct calls to routines in the program code. The system now works with Clipper, BASCOM and other languages. [PROPAK] Programmer's Productivity Pack (Falk, Bob ASP; $79) is a software package designed to provide the utilities and reference tools most frequently needed by programmers. Previous versions were retail-only. Included is a calculator that works simultaneously in decimal, binary, hexadecimal, and octal. Other features include an ASCII & Color Attribute Chart, keystroke reference center, keystroke recording and playback, screen capture with filtering, background printing, a pop-up DOS shell, and more. These programming tools can run stand-alone or as pop-ups. Support isprovided for dual monitor systems. A hard disk is recommended. [ProLite] ProLite (Falk Data Systems ASP; $22) is a subset of the larger Programmer's Productivity Pak. It includes productivity tools for programmers, a programmer's calculator, keystroke reference center, ASCII and color attribute chart, and pop-up DOS shell. It uses swapping technology to free all but 7K of DOS memory when resident. It can also be loaded as a stand-alone, DESQview-aware program, or as a normal memory-resident program without swapping. [Renamer] Renamer (ConVal Software, Inc. ASP; $42) renames file and symbol references in your source files. This can be used to rename certain variables for purposes of standardizing or exporting code. Supports BASIC, BAT files, C, C++, COBOL, FORTRAN, MASM, Oracle, Pascal, PL/I, REXX, SQL and xBASE. [Versatil] Versatil 1.11 (Glaze, Michael M.; $20) is a set of programmer's utilities in a pop-up 5K TSR. Utilities include an ASCII chart, box drawing, color attribute, date converter, number converter, scan codes, and a screen mask.