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▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▄ ▒▒▄ ▒▒█▀▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█▀▒▒█ ▒▒█▀▀▀▀ ▒▒█▀▀▀▀ ▀▒▒█▀▀ ▒▒█▀▒▒█ ▒▒█▀▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒▒▒▒█▀ ▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒▒▒▒█▀ ▒▒▒▒█▀ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█▀▒▒▄ ▒▒█▀▀▀ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█▀▒▒▄ ▒▒█▀ ▒▒▒▒▒█▀ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒█ ▒▒▒▒▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▄▄▒▒▒▄ ▒▒█▀▀▀▀ ▒▒█▀▒▒█ ▒▒█▀▀▀▀ ▒▒█▀▀▀▀ ▒▒█▀▒▒█ ▒▒█▀▒▒█ ▒▒█▒▒█▒▒█ ▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒█▀ ▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▀▀▒▒█ ▒▒█▀▀▀ ▒▒█▀▒▒▄ ▒▒█▀▀▀ ▒▒█▀▀▀ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒▒▄ ▒▒▒▒▒█▀ ▒▒▒▒▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▒▒█ ▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀▀▀▀▀ ▀▀ ▀▀ VERSION 4.60 Copyright 1989 - 1992 by Gordon Haff and Bit Masons Consulting. All rights reserved. Command: DF Syntax: DF [d:][source-path][file-mask] [d:][target-path] [/O,N,E,D,T,or O][+/-] [/M(0,T,P, or C)] [/F] [/V] [/Ccfg_file] Prereqs: 100% IBM Compatible PC running DOS 3.0 or higher Purpose: DF provides a fast, compact alternative to both the DOS `dir' command and large, unwieldy hard disk managers. DF displays all files in a directory in sorted order (name, date, size, attribute, or extension) and provides an easy way to copy, delete and rename marked files. The directory structure on the disk can be quickly traversed by simply selecting a directory name from the displayed list. A wide range of user-defined functions and SmartViewers enables DF to work with and augment existing customer software. DF is very simple to use. A menu of DF's basic functions is displayed next to the list of files; no need for the novice or infrequent user to refer to a manual or a complex set of help screens. There is on-line help, however, and it can be customized by the user! DF is also advanced. A wide range of functions such as directory creation, file date/time alteration, archive file creation, and directory printing are available on alternate menus which are displayed merely by pressing the Alt, Control, or Shift key. In addition to the many intrinsic functions, the companion program DFCONFIG allows users to add their favorite programs to DF's menus or file viewers. DFCONFIG also makes it easy to change operational features such as the default color. ┌─────────┐ ┌─────┴───┐ │ (tm) ──│ │o │────────────────── │ ┌─────┴╨──┐ │ Association of │ │ │─┘ Shareware └───│ o │ Professionals ──────│ ║ │──────────────────── └────╨────┘ MEMBER TABLE OF CONTENTS ----------------- 1.0 History and Program Philosophy .......................... 8 2.0 Installing Directory Freedom ............................ 9 2.1 Upgrading from Earlier Versions .................... 9 2.2 Using the Installation Program ..................... 10 2.3 Manual Installation Instructions ................... 10 2.4 COMSPEC variable ................................... 11 3.0 Using Directory Freedom ................................. 12 3.1 About this Manual .................................. 12 3.2 Manual Conventions ................................. 13 3.3 Program Limits and Prerequisites ................... 13 3.4 Starting up Directory Freedom ...................... 13 3.5 Changing Directories ............................... 15 3.6 File Marking ....................................... 15 3.7 Hints and Suggestions .............................. 15 3.8 Key by key Summary of Commands (by category) ....... 17 Exiting DF .......................................... 17 Marking files ....................................... 17 Copying, Moving, and Deleting files ................. 18 Changing active source and destination directories .. 18 Re-sorting the working directory .................... 19 DOS Shell functions ................................. 19 Directory functions ................................. 19 Miscellaneous additional commands ................... 19 View Commands ....................................... 20 Attribute Commands .................................. 20 User-defined Commands ............................... 20 Internal Viewer commands ............................ 21 4.0 Program Feature Information ............................. 21 4.1 Internal Viewer .................................... 21 4.2 Shell functions and SmartViewers ................... 22 User-defined functions .............................. 22 Viewers ............................................. 22 Run a Program ....................................... 23 DOS Shell ........................................... 23 4.3 Attribute Functions ................................ 24 4.4 Mouse Support ...................................... 24 4.5 Network Support .................................... 25 4.6 About Configuration Files .......................... 25 4.7 System Information Screen .......................... 26 4.8 Ultravision Compatibility .......................... 27 4.9 DESQview and Microsoft Windows Compatibility ....... 27 5.0 Customization ........................................... 28 5.1 DFCONFIG Command Line .............................. 28 5.2 Creating a Configuration File ...................... 29 5.3 DFCONFIG Usage Notes ............................... 29 5.4 DFCONFIG Main Menu ................................. 30 5.5 Commands Modification .............................. 31 Command-line syntax ................................. 32 Example ............................................. 32 Archiver Command .................................... 34 Other command line controls ......................... 34 5.6 Attributes Modification ............................ 35 Color ............................................... 36 Switch .............................................. 36 Snow Check .......................................... 36 Sort Option ......................................... 37 Verify Default ...................................... 38 Beep Default ........................................ 38 Extended Keyboard ................................... 39 SmartViewer Key ..................................... 39 Secondary Menu Key .................................. 39 Mouse ............................................... 40 Startup Video Mode .................................. 40 Exclude Attributes .................................. 40 Printer Port ........................................ 40 Disable CFG Read .................................... 41 Drive Table ......................................... 41 Drive Table Keys .................................... 41 Memory Allocation ................................... 42 5.7 Read Help Screen ................................... 43 5.8 Filenames .......................................... 43 6.0 Companion Programs ...................................... 44 6.1 Bit Masons Programs ................................ 44 X-Ray Viewers ....................................... 44 ND .................................................. 45 6.2 Third-Party Programs ............................... 45 PRUNE ............................................... 45 SLED or TED or QEDIT or ... ........................ 45 LIST ................................................ 46 VPIC ................................................ 46 RVS ................................................. 46 7.0 Technical and Sources ................................... 46 8.0 Acknowledgements ........................................ 47 9.0 Appendix A: User-defined Commands ........................ 49 10.0 Appendix B: Patching Instructions ....................... 50 RN.COM .............................................. 50 PRUNE.COM ........................................... 50 11.0 Appendix C: Site Licenses ............................... 51 12.0 Appendix D: Keystrokes for Data-entry ................... 52 13.0 Appendix E: "Undocumented" Patches ...................... 53 14.0 Appendix F: System Information Screen ................... 54 CPU ................................................. 54 Memory .............................................. 54 BIOS ................................................ 55 Sound ............................................... 55 DOS ................................................. 56 Hardware ............................................ 56 Disks ............................................... 57 Video ............................................... 57 Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 3 DISCLAIMER of WARRANTY (a.k.a. Legal Stuff) ------------------------------------------- The Shareware evaluation (trial use) version is provided AS IS. Bit Masons Consulting MAKES NO WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION, ANY WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND/OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. Bit Masons Consulting warrants the physical diskette(s) and physical documentation provided with registered versions (only) to be free of defects in materials and workmanship for a period of thirty days from the date of registration. If Bit Masons Consulting receives notification within the warranty period of defects in materials or workmanship, and such notification is determined by the publisher to be correct, the defective diskette(s) or documentation will be replaced. The entire and exclusive liability and remedy for breach of this Limited Warranty shall be limited to replacement of defective diskette(s) or documentation and shall not include or extend to any claim for or right to recover any other damages, including but not limited to, loss of profit, data, or use of the software, or special, incidental, or consequential damages or other similar claims, even if Bit Masons Consulting has been specifically advised of the possibility of such damages. In no event will Bit Masons Consultings' liability for any damages to you or any other person ever exceed the lower of suggested list price or actual price paid for the license to use the software, regardless of any form of the claim. BIT MASONS CONSULTING SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIMS ALL OTHER WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO, ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY AND/OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. LICENSE ------- Directory Freedom is a Shareware product. As such, it is made available to the general personal computing public for evaluation. Users are licensed to operate this program on their computers for the purpose of test and evaluation on a trial basis for a limited trial period. It is not possible to reasonably define the limits of a fair and equitable time period for evaluation; therefore it is left to the user's judgment and sense of fair play as to the time required to make a decision as to its usefulness. (As a guideline, 30 days should generally be sufficient time to evaluate the utility of a program of this type.) If the user decides the program is not of sufficient merit to warrant purchase through registration with the author, he/she should remove the program from his/her personal computer. Otherwise, if the program is deemed useful and is in regular use on the user's computer system, registration with the author is required. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 4 Registered users are those users who elect to pay for Directory Freedom and register that payment with the author. By virtue of registration and payment for the program, registered users are granted a license to continue to utilize the program on their personal computer for as long as they choose. This license authorizes the user to use the program on any personal computer system he or she may own or use so long as the program is operated on only one computer system at a time. GUARANTEE --------- Directory Freedom is offered with an unconditional 30-day money-back guarantee. If you become dissatisfied with the program for any reason within that period, just let me know and your registration fee will be refunded. If you purchased a registration package which included a diskette and/or a manual, please return these when requesting a refund. This guarantee is unconditional. I would ask, however, if you are having a problem to let me know before giving up on DF since your problem may be something I can solve. Finally, if you order a registration package which includes a diskette or manual and either of these items are defective - either through my error or through postal service "processing", let me know and I will send replacements promptly. REGISTRATION ------------ The registration fee is $25, payable to: Bit Masons Consulting 3205 Windsor Ridge Dr. Westboro, MA 01581 The payment of this registration fee to the author entitles the user to full use of the product for an unlimited period of time in addition to product support and a diskette with the latest version and other utilities written by the author. Hardcopy documentation and future updates are not included as part of the basic registration fee. See the REGISTER.DOC file for the charges associated with these services. Directory Freedom is a fully functional Shareware product. Shareware is a computer program distribution and marketing method that permits potential buyers to thoroughly try the program prior to purchase. It is NOT free and it is not in the Public Domain. If, after evaluating the program, you find it useful enough to use on a regular basis, you are expected to pay for it by registering with the author. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 5 Please note that the registration fee is specifically limited to Directory Freedom (DF.COM), the configuration program (DFCONFIG.EXE), and their associated documentation. Other copyrighted "Freeware" (i.e. copyrighted software for which no fee is asked) and public domain software may be distributed with Directory Freedom only for the convenience of users. The copyrights for such software remain with the original authors. In addition, various software is mentioned in this documentation in conjunction with DF's user-defined functions and SmartViewers. Much of this software is Shareware for which a registration fee must be paid to the individual authors to use their programs past an initial trial period. Site Licensing -------------- Attractively priced site licensing is available for commercial users. Pricing for "typical" site licensing is given in an appendix to this manual. If you have needs which are not met by the standard license terms, please call or write for a quote which addresses any unique support or product update requirements. Customization is also available on a contract basis. Upgrade and Update Policies --------------------------- There has been some confusion in Shareware circles recently about upgrade/update policies for certain pieces of software. Therefore, I'd like to take this opportunity to spell out my policies. First, some definitions: I define upgrade as the RIGHT to use a later revision of a piece of software. I define update as the physical media on which the upgrade resides. I'll further define an update as not including hardcopy documentation unless specifically defined. With that out of the way, I'd like to spell out my current upgrade/update policies: There are no upgrade charges associated with DF and I do not have any plans at present to institute such charges with future revisions. I do reserve the right to do so, however, if in my sole opinion the nature and magnitude of DF changes to such a degree as to constitute a substantially new product. I currently do charge for updates and plan to continue to so charge. The content and pricing for specific update packages is described at the end of this document and in the REGISTER.DOC file. Pricing is subject to change without notice, however, to accommodate postage, printing, and other price increases. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 6 ASP Ombudsman Statement ----------------------- This program is produced by a member of the Association of Shareware Professionals (ASP). ASP wants to make sure that the shareware principle works for you. If you are unable to resolve a shareware-related problem with an ASP member by contacting the member directly, ASP may be able to help. The ASP Ombudsman can help you resolve a dispute or problem with an ASP member, but does not provide technical support for members' products. Please write to the ASP Ombudsman at 545 Grover Road, Muskegon, MI 49442 or send a Compuserve message via Easyplex to ASP Ombudsman 70007,3536. DISTRIBUTING Directory Freedom ------------------------------ DF may be freely distributed subject only to the following distribution for-charge restrictions: Directory Freedom is the sole property of Gordon Haff. The program may be freely copied and transferred to individual parties for evaluation purposes. It may be posted on Bulletin Board systems (BBS) for electronic access as long as NO FEE is charged for its distribution except for private BBS operations that charge a regular user subscription fee. Computer information services such as Compuserve (CIS), Genie, and Byte Information Exchange (BIX) are authorized to post this product for subscriber access. Directory Freedom may be distributed on diskette only by 1) disk distributors/vendors who are associate members of the Association of Shareware Professionals (ASP) or 2) users groups which do not charge more than a nominal fee to cover the costs of distribution. Any changes to these policies must be made in writing by the author. Please feel free to distribute copies of this program to friends, coworkers, bulletin boards, and users' groups. I do ask, however, that you please distribute all of the original files and not modified copies. The main reason for this is that modified (e.g. with DFCONFIG) versions may have different default attributes or other settings from those specified in the manual and will have different CRC values from those files in the standard distribution. The former could confuse new users. The latter may cause someone to conclude that DF is damaged. In particular, some non-default (but user selectable) switch settings such as "Enable F11/F12" will not work properly on systems without the requisite hardware and BIOS support. If you have come up with user-defined settings which you would like to share with others, please do so by describing them in a separate file (or by distributing a copy of your own .CFG file) rather than distributing a modified version of DF.COM. I strongly encourage such sharing of ideas about using DF most effectively. Please distribute such information in a separate archive, however, rather than adding to my archive. Thank you in advance for your cooperation. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 7 TECHNICAL SUPPORT ----------------- Registered Users: Full technical support is available to registered users of Directory Freedom. I have found that the most effective product support can be delivered through the electronic services listed below. If this option is not open to you, however, I also offer full product support through the mails, or, if the problem absolutely cannot wait, the telephone (no collect calls please). I will do my best to resolve any software bugs in a timely manner and I am always open to incorporating new features or changes which are appropriate to the nature of the product. Unregistered Users: I will attempt to respond to software trouble reports made by non-registered users if the problems concern the general functionality of the program. Such users should not, however, expect product support beyond initial aid in determining whether the program is suitable for their needs. If you have a problem: I ask that, before calling or writing, you take the following steps: 1) Check the manual. We all sometimes approach a piece of software with preconceived ideas about how it ought to work which may not correspond to how it actually does work. (Of course, I'm interested in your input if you have this sort of experience.) 2) See if you can duplicate the problem with your original, unmodified version of DF. (You do still have an original, unmodified version, don't you?) 3) If you're still stuck, please make a note of a) your hardware and software environment; b) your attribute and command settings. DF is a very configurable program and, unfortunately, one of the downsides of this configurability is that user-defined settings can sometimes interact in unexpected ways. (I try to test a broad range of configurations and settings, but obviously can't try every one.); and c) the sequence of actions which lead to the error. If I can't reproduce an error, it will be very difficult to correct, so your help is vital in isolating the problem. If you follow these steps, it will help me to solve your problem in a more efficient and timely manner. Contact via: Channel 1 BBS (617) 354-8873 Compuserve User ID# 72561,2637 (use Easyplex mail) Internet 72561.2637@compuserve.com U.S. Mail 3205 Windsor Ridge Dr. Westboro MA 01581 Telephone (508) 898-3321 (after 6pm Eastern time) I usually check Channel 1 daily and Compuserve weekly. In addition, I monitor the Ilink and RIME Shareware relays through Channel 1. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 8 1.0 History and Program Philosophy ------------------------------------ The Directory Freedom of today originally grew out of a variety of programs which owe their "look and feel" to Michael Mefford's DR and CO utilities in PC Magazine Volume 6, #17 and #21. DF was most directly adapted from Peter Esherick's DC (Directory Control) version 1.05B. Peter helped get DF started by making the source code for DC available to me and has also shared some fixes which he has made in subsequent revisions of his program. DF came into being because, while DC became a staple in my utilities subdirectory, it still lacked a few features which I wanted. Some of these were included in Brad Stephenson's modifications to DR; others didn't exist at all. At the same time, more conventional DOS shells usually lacked these features as well plus they tended to be rather big clunky things by comparison. The initial revisions of Directory Freedom represented minor enhancements to DC. As time went by, users suggested more and better features, many of which were incorporated into DF. With Revision 3.0, I made DF shareware. I felt that, at this point, DF had achieved a unique identity and was substantially different from the software on which it was originally based. Furthermore, by making DF shareware, I was able to commit to a significantly higher level of ongoing development and support than would have otherwise been possible. So what uniquely defines DF? Some of the major features are listed below. These are just a sampling but should help to give the user of one or more of the earlier programs mentioned a flavor for how DF has been extended from its original roots. The usual file copying, moving, deleting, and renaming Directory creation, deletion, and renaming Ability to run external programs from a menu (and pass them file names, etc.) SmartViewers (external file viewers calls keyed to file extension) File and directory attribute manipulation Send a directory listing to a printer Change file dates On-line help Support for 43/50 line modes with EGA/VGA High degree of configurability: colors, beep type, verify flag, exclude attributes and more Command-line file mask (e.g. *.exe) A wide range of sort methods (including by attribute) Create file archives (e.g. with PKZIP) A detailed system configuration screen A user-friendly configuration program Yet, for all the above, the main DF program is still less than 35 KBytes in size! (As you might guess, it's written 100% in assembly language.) Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 9 Directory Freedom is designed to provide what one user called "a rational alternative to the DOS 'dir' command." While, at this stage in its development, DF has grown far past the point where it merely provides DOS directory services, I have tried to stay true to one fundamental philosophy of design. This philosophy is that DF should stay sufficiently small and fast that you does not feel that you are bringing up an applications program every time you type "DF". Rather, the user should find it faster and easier to just type "DF" that typing DIR, or COPY, or whatever other DOS command is required. Along the way, additional functionality has been added, but with the intent of never compromising this basic design goal. 2.0 Installing Directory Freedom ---------------------------------- Installing Directory Freedom is straightforward. You may either use the supplied installation program (diskettes purchased directly from Bit Masons only) or you may manually extract the contents of the .ZIP format archives. Manual extraction requires that you use the PKUNZIP decompression/dearchive program from PKWare (not supplied). 2.1 Upgrading from Earlier Versions ------------------------------------- Whenever you upgrade, I strongly recommend that you make a copy of your old revision working files (DF.COM, DFCONFIG.EXE, and any configuration files) and put them in a safe place. While I conduct extensive testing, it is never possible to absolutely guarantee that something about your hardware and/or software environment won't have an allergic reaction to a new revision. Keeping your old revision files somewhere safe will allow you always to easily move back to the previous revision in the case of problems. If you are upgrading from a version prior to 4.50, skip to the next section. DFCONFIG is not compatible with these older revisions because of extensive additions made in version 4.50. Simply make a note of your settings and spend a few minutes reentering them after installation is complete. If you are upgrading from version 4.50, you may bring over user-defined commands and attributes using DFCONFIG, if you so desire, by performing the following steps: If you store your configuration info internal to DF.COM, life is easy Backup your version 4.50 files Rename DF.COM to DF450.COM (for example) Install the new program version in the same directory as the old To bring over your old settings and install the new help Type DFCONFIG df450.com df.com Choose the "Read Help Screen" menu item and select the DFHELP.TXT file Confirm that you know what you're doing Select "Save and Quit" from the main menu Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 10 If you store your configuration info in an external .CFG file, life is even easier Backup your version 4.50 files Install the new program version in the same directory as the old; your existing configuration files will be used automatically To update the help screen (not required, but a good idea): Type DFCONFIG df.cfg where df.cfg is the name of the configuration file. (If you use another name for your configuration file, use that.) Choose the "Read Help Screen" menu item and select the DFHELP.TXT file Confirm that you know what you're doing Select "Save and Quit" from the main menu Repeat for any other configuration files you use 2.2 Using the Installation Program ------------------------------------ 1) Make a backup of the distribution disk 2) Insert the distribution disk in a floppy disk drive. 3) Type A:INSTALL (assuming the distribution disk is in Drive A) 4) The installation program will prompt you for the destination directory for Directory Freedom and its companion files (such as the X-Ray Viewers). Only DF.COM itself is required to run Directory Freedom. You may wish to initially extract the Directory Freedom files to their own directory and then move only the executables you plan to make use of (e.g. DF.COM, DFCONFIG.EXE, and whatever archive viewers you use) to a working directory contained in your PATH statement such as a utilities directory. 5) Make sure that you have a COMSPEC environment variable defined per Section 2.4 6) The file README.DFD on the distribution diskette (diskettes purchased directly from Bit Masons only) can be read at any time by typing TYPE README.DFD | MORE at the DOS prompt. This file may contain updated information not available when this manual went to press. 7) Run DFCONFIG.EXE at any time to change program settings. (See Section 5 for more information.) (Now that wasn't hard, was it?) 2.3 Manual Installation Instructions -------------------------------------- The main Directory Freedom files are contained in the archive file DF460.ZIP. This archive contains all files required to use Directory Freedom in addition to documentation, registration information, and miscellaneous support files. A complete description of the archive contents are contained in the README.DF file in the archive. The README.DF file also describes companion archives distributed by Bit Masons which can be used either by themselves or to enhance Directory Freedom's capabilities. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 11 After extracting DF460.ZIP, copy the files DF.COM and (optionally) other files such as DFCONFIG.EXE and DFCONFIG.HLP to a working floppy diskette or a subdirectory on your hard disk. If you've got a hard disk, the easiest thing is probably just to copy these files to whatever subdirectory you normally keep your utilities in. Since DF is nice and small and simple, there's really no need to go off creating a separate subdirectory for it. To be most useful, whatever subdirectory DF ends up in should be part of the PATH setup in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. You can also go ahead and copy any of the associated utilities distributed with DF to the same location if you like and do whatever you normally do with the documentation. After you've done all this, put your original files in a safe place! Having the original files will allow you to start over again if something happens and your modified files are lost or corrupted. Please also use the original files if you ever have an urge to distribute copies of this program to a local bulletin board or user's group. At this, or any other point, you can also run the DFCONFIG customization program. Full instructions for doing so are given in Section 5.0 of this manual. DFCONFIG.EXE allows you to easily configure DF, so you'll probably want to keep it handy [unless you are in an environment in which you are setting up DF in a standard manner for the use of others and don't want that standard setup to be changed]. **Revision 4.5 Note**: In the interests of further increasing user-configurability (more switches, longer and more user-defined command lines, multiple extensions per SmartViewer) many changes were made in the user-changable data area of DF in revision 4.50. As a result, users of earlier revisions will need to bring their switch settings and command lines over from previous revs manually. Revision 4.50 configurations are compatible with version 4.60. Finally, you MUST make sure that you have a COMSPEC environment variable defined. This is explained below. 2.4 COMSPEC variable ---------------------- When DF shells to (i.e. executes) another program, it uses something called the COMSPEC variable located in its environment block. This variable tells DF what command interpreter it should use when it shells and where that command interpreter is located. Now in the good old days, most programs didn't bother to look for this variable. They just assumed it was COMMAND.COM and that it was located in the root directory of the current drive. Nowadays, fortunately or unfortunately depending upon your point of view, things aren't so simple. Some people use software such as J.P. Software's excellent 4DOS as a COMMAND.COM replacement (a version of 4DOS is included with the Norton Utilities as NDOS). Others don't want to put COMMAND.COM in the root directory of every drive they Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 12 use. The result is that good software doesn't go around making assumptions any longer. It looks to see what the user actually wants. How does the user tell the software what she wants? By setting the COMSPEC variable. How do you set it? In the following manner: At the DOS prompt (or more commonly in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file), type or include a line like the following: SET COMSPEC=C:\COMMAND.COM The above example tells your software to look in the root directory of your C: drive for the COMMAND.COM interpreter. This is probably the most common setting for users with hard disks. Other common settings include the following: SET COMSPEC=\COMMAND.COM (look in root of current drive) or SET COMSPEC=C:\4DOS.COM (Use 4DOS in root of C:) You can check your COMSPEC (and other environment settings) at any time by typing SET at the DOS command line. If you found this whole section hopelessly confusing, just use one the COMMAND.COM settings listed above. Use the first if you have a hard drive and the second if you have only floppies. Ask a friend to modify your AUTOEXEC.BAT file if you don't know how to do so. 3.0 Using Directory Freedom ----------------------------- I'm tempted at this point to offer a monetary reward to anyone who has actually read this far into the manual. (But I'm not going to -- sorry.) If you're still with us and awake -- Congratulations! (but no cash prizes). DF is so easy to use that people like me probably think they don't need to read the manual. I suggest reviewing the full manual anyway; DF has many advanced features and shortcuts which even experienced users can overlook. 3.1 About this Manual ----------------------- This documentation was written at a level which, I hope, is appropriate to the level of computer sophistication of most DF users. This level assumes a degree of familiarity with keyboard usage on an IBM-PC/AT compatible and a basic understanding of how DOS runs programs and executes commands. DF attempts to make life easier for the person who knows how to use the command line but, unlike a DOS shell, does not try to insulate the user from the underlying system. If the above scares you a bit, don't let it. We have all been beginners at one time and I'm sure you can borrow a book or friend who will help you through any rough spots you run into. (And feedback on any spots of opaqueness in this manual is always welcome as well.) Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 13 This manual does go into some depth explaining the how's and why's of certain functions. These explanations exist largely to satisfy the curiosity of the more technical users of this program and therefore the beginning user should not feel put off if he does not understand every concept mentioned in these supplementary discussions. 3.2 Manual Conventions ------------------------ The commands on the main alternate menu are designated throughout this manual as Alt-Fx commands for simplicity and consistency with previous revisions of this program even though they can be alternately defined as LeftShift-Fx. Which, by the way, suggests that I'd better say what I mean by expressions such as Alt F1. It means that you should press on the Alt key with one finger and (while continuing to hold down the Alt key) press the F1 key with some other appendage. The Source or Working directory refers to the directory which is being displayed on the screen by DF. The Target directory is the default destination for copies and other operations. It is also the current DOS directory (meaning that a user-defined command which sends output to the current DOS directory will send that output to the DF Target directory. 3.3 Program Limits and Prerequisites -------------------------------------- Maximum of about 1500 files in a directory (unless small memory setting used in which case the limit is about 400-500) Up to 1GB per logical disk Operating system revision of at least DOS 3.0 Minimum 192MB of memory; more memory is useful if you use user-defined commands 3.4 Starting up Directory Freedom ----------------------------------- The basic syntax of the DF command line is: DF [d:][source-path][file-mask] [d:][target-path] [/O,N,E,D,T,or O][+/-] [/M(0,T,P, or C)] [/F] [/V] [/Ccfg_file] All parameters are optional. If no pathnames are entered, both the source and the target directories default to the current DOS directory. If only one path is entered, this path is taken to be that of the source directory and the target directory defaults to the current DOS directory. (Pathnames can be a maximum of 63 characters long, starting at the drive letter and including the filename.) The file-mask is a wildcard specification such as *.EXE which allows for the display of a subset of files in a directory. Options, specified by a "/" followed by a letter, may appear either before or after the pathnames and override any settings made with the DFCONFIG program. The options are as follows: Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 14 /N Sort directory by filename /E Sort directory by extension /D Sort directory by date and time /S Sort directory by file size /T Sort Directory by attribute (i.e. archive, hidden, read-only, system) /O Use original order, i.e. do not sort directory at all. + or - Any of the sort attributes can be appended with a + or a - on the command line (though the suffix has no effect on an Original order "sort"). A + indicates that the sort is to take place in ascending order, while a - indicates that it is to be in descending order. If no suffix is specified, the sort will take place in whatever has been stored as the default order for that key. /M0 Use "small" memory setting of 64KB for both DF's code and directory. Use for maximum shell space when no XMS or EMS memory is available. (DF requires memory space for code approximately equal to the size of DF.COM.) /MT Use full 64KB segment for directory. Swap to XMS memory, if available, when shelling /MP Use full 64KB segment for directory. Swap to EMS memory, if available, when shelling /MC Use full 64KB segment for directory. /V Turn on DOS Verify switch for disk file writes /F Fast display on IBM Color Graphics Adapter (CGA) - i.e. no snow check /Ccfg_file Use specified cfg_file for parameter and command-line settings Examples of valid command lines: DF Use default settings. Source directory = Target directory = Current DOS DF c:\util Use default settings. Source directory = c:\util. Target = current DOS DF c:\util\*.com As above, but display only files with a .COM extension DF .. Source directory = Parent (directory above current). Target = current DOS DF . c:\util Source directory = current. Target = c:\util DF c:\util d:\foo Source directory = c:\util. Target = d:\foo DF c:\util /N- Source directory = c:\util. Display files in descending name order DF c:\util /T /V Force verify ON for all disk file writes. Sort in default attribute order DF /Cdft.cfg Use settings stored in the configuration file DFT.CFG DF comes up displaying the source directory. A brief menu of optional commands is displayed to the right of the directory display. You may move up and down the directory list with the up and down arrow keys on the cursor keypad. Files may be individually copied, deleted, moved or renamed by pressing the function keys F1 through F4, respectively. Alternatively, a number of files may be selected, Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 15 or "marked" using the Grey + and Grey - keys on the right side of the keypad. After marking, pressing the appropriate function key will apply the chosen operation to the entire group of files. 3.5 Changing Directories -------------------------- The source (displayed) directory can be changed in one of three ways: Press the F9 function key and enter a new drive and path name. (The Backspace key is a shortcut for typing F9 followed by .. (double dot). This shortcut is primarily intended for those using networks which may not display the .. parent directories as part of the file/directory display in some configurations.) Use the left and right arrow keys to move through your drive table To move to different subdirectories on the same drive, simply press the <Enter> key after using the up or down arrow keys to highlight the desired subdirectory. Note that as always within DOS, ".." denotes the parent of a given subdirectory, i.e. the level above the currently displayed directory, and "." denotes the current directory. The target directory can be changed either by using the F10 key in a manner analogous to the F9 key or by swapping the source and target directories with the F8 key, changing the directory in one of the ways described above, and then swapping things back with the F8 key again. However, note that any file marks are erased when the source (displayed) directory is changed. 3.6 File Marking ------------------ Entries may be marked with the following exceptions. The marking keys will NOT operate on the following: Subdirectories Hidden files 3.7 Hints and Suggestions --------------------------- The following techniques, explanations, and hints have proven useful to myself or to other users. They may help you to get more out of your copy of Directory Freedom. To "re-mark" a group of files (i.e. mark the same group of files which have just been operated on and which now have a * next to their entries) press F6 and F7 in sequence. (If you have an extended keyboard, just use the F11 function.) One of the PC Magazine utilities is called SWEEP and allows you to automatically repeat the execution of a command through multiple directories. If you type 'SWEEP DF' from the root directory, therefore, DF will be executed in succession in each directory on the hard disk. Ben Stock suggests that this "is the best thing for housekeeping, reclaiming disk space, and preparing for major backups." SWEEP should be available on most major bulletin boards. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 16 Dir of Source E:\ Target D:\TD\PROGS\DF\DF460 ACTOR <DIR> 9-20-91 9:46p ╔════════════════════════╗ AFTERDRK <DIR> 3-27-92 6:48p ║ Directory Freedom ║ AMIPRO <DIR> 10-09-91 11:32p ║ Version 4.60 ║ CORELDRW <DIR> 9-20-91 9:47p ║ Copr. Gordon Haff 1992 ║ DASH <DIR> 12-14-92 6:52p ╟────────────────────────╢ DEMYSTS <DIR> 10-04-92 4:13p ║ F1 Copy ║ EXCEL <DIR> 9-21-91 6:13p ║ F2 Delete ║ FORMS <DIR> 9-20-91 11:14p ║ F3 Move ║ ICO <DIR> 9-20-91 9:48p ║ F4 Rename ║ MSCOPE <DIR> 10-04-92 4:09p ║ F5 Clear marks ║ NDW <DIR> 9-21-91 5:35p ║ F6 Mark remainder ║ PERFORM <DIR> 9-20-91 10:38p ║ F7 Swap Mark/Unmark ║ POWERPNT <DIR> 9-20-91 9:43p ║ F8 Swap Source/Target║ TRASHCAN <DIR> 10-10-91 12:01aH ║ F9 Change Source ║ WINDOWS <DIR> 9-20-91 9:44p ║ F10 Change Target ║ WINMCAD <DIR> 12-29-91 8:31p ║ F11 Re-Mark files ║ WINWORD <DIR> 9-20-91 9:45p ║ F12 Secondary Viewer ║ LOGFILE TXT 63796 10-03-92 11:32p A ║ Alt-Z Help ║ SPINRITE LOG 29325 10-26-91 2:39p A ║ Esc or Alt-Q to Exit ║ TREEINFO DT 2658 10-30-91 1:46a A ╚════════════════════════╝ Volume: WINDOWS 7,241,728 bytes free Target disk has 8,394,752 bytes free 1 of 21. 102,400 bytes/ 4 files Figure 1. Example of opening DF screen. This screen displays a typical Directory Freedom file listing. The displayed directory is referred to throughout this manual as the Source or Working directory. The Target directory is shown on the second line of the display. This directory is the default destination for copies and moves; it is also the current DOS directory - and hence the default directory for many user-defined commands. The main menu is shown on the right. Other menus are brought up my pressing the Alt (or Left-Shift), Control, or Right-Shift keys. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- To pop up a directory level, highlight the '..' entry and press <Enter>. The DF Target directory is also the current DOS directory. Hence user-defined commands which send output files to the default directory regardless of the directory of the source file (e.g. PKUNZIP) will send their output to the DF Target directory -- NOT the (displayed) Source directory. To print a file, COPY the file to your print device. For example, to print a file to LPT1:, press F1 and give LPT1 or PRN (note that there is no trailing colon) as the destination file name. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 17 To efficiently pack files on to multiple floppies, do a sort in descending size order. This way, DF will copy the all the files it can (starting with the largest) onto each diskette in order. When DF runs out of room on a diskette, it will skip all files which don't fit. Just put in a new diskette and press the COPY key again. (There's a bit of beeping associated with this procedure -- if you set the Beep Option to "Beep 1" rather than "DOS Beep", the sound is a good bit less obnoxious.) JOIN and SUBST are relics of an ancient DOS past which Microsoft introduced primarily to deal with programs which came from an even more ancient past. You probably shouldn't be using them and I can't guarantee that DF will do everything perfectly on drives that have been JOINed or SUBSTituted. Most of the time, everything seems to work fine but some odd problems have been reported from time to time. 3.8 Key by key Summary of Commands (by category) -------------------------------------------------- Exiting DF ---------- Esc Exit program and return to original directory. Ctrl Q Exit program leaving the currently displayed directory (source) as the current default drive and directory for DOS. Marking files ------------- Grey + Mark current file entry, if not a subdirectory or hidden or Ins file, and advance cursor to next line. Grey - Remove mark on current file, and advance cursor to next line. or Del Space Toggle marking of highlighted file. Same as Grey + (Mark) unless currently highlighted file is already marked, in which case it is the same as Grey - (Remove Mark). F5 Clear all marks. F6 Mark all remaining files, i.e. those not marked with an * . F7 Swap marked and unmarked files. F11 Re-mark files (i.e. mark those files with *'s next to their names) This function is equivalent to F6 followed by F7. Most functions operate on the marked files, if any, otherwise they operate on the currently highlighted file. If the operation is successful the mark is replaced with an asterisk (*), if unsuccessful the file is passed over, leaving the mark, and the program proceeds on to the next marked file. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 18 Copying, Moving, and Deleting files ----------------------------------- F1 Copy file(s) via a read/write sequence to requested target or Ctrl C Alt F1 Protected Copy - similar to F1 except that an error is generated if the target file already exists or cannot be written to (e.g. is Read-only or Hidden) F2 Delete file(s) or directory after asking for confirmation (unless empty directory). Directories containing subdirectories or Read-Only/Hidden files cannot be deleted. F3 Move file(s), i.e. Copy to requested target, delete source. or Ctrl M Where possible this function is performed using an across directory rename instead of a file read/write sequence. Alt F3 Forced Move - Unlike a regular move (F3), this option will overwrite the target file if it already exists. (This command has the same relationship to MOVE as COPY has to PROTECTED COPY.) F4 Rename file(s) or directory within the currently displayed (source) directory. Changing active source and destination directories -------------------------------------------------- F8 Swap the Source Directory and the Target Directory. F9 Prompt for a new Source Directory. F10 Prompt for a new Target Directory. ] Make the Target Directory equal to the Source Directory. [ Make the Source Directory equal to the Target Directory. <Left Arrow> Change to next drive specified in Drive Table. <Right Arrow> Change to previous drive specified in Drive Table. Backspace Pop the Source Directory up one level. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 19 Re-sorting the working directory -------------------------------- Alt N Sort by filename (ascending) Ctrl N (descending) Alt E Sort by file extension (e.g. .COM vs .DOC). (ascending) Ctrl E (descending) Alt D Sort by date and time. (ascending) Ctrl D (descending) Alt S Sort by file size. (ascending) Ctrl S (descending) Alt T Sort by attribute (ascending) Ctrl T (archive, read-only, hidden, system) (descending) Alt O Re-read and display dir in original DOS order (unsorted) Ctrl O (unsorted) However you sort the files, note that the actual order of the files on the disk is unchanged. Sorting changes only the display of files within Directory Freedom; any changes to the sort order are not written to disk. Attribute sorting sorts by the value of the attribute bits such as Archive and Read-only. DOS Shell functions ------------------- Alt F2 Invoke DOS Shell. Alt F5 Runs the highlighted program. Parameters to insert after the program name are prompted for. Directory functions ------------------- Alt F6 Create a directory. Creates a new subdirectory under the Source Directory using a name provided by the user. Miscellaneous additional commands --------------------------------- Alt F4 Re-read source directory. Required after changing diskettes in a floppy disk drive. Also useful if a copy or shell command has changed the directory's contents. Alt F7 Displays system information screen Alt F8 Swap video mode between 25 lines and 43 lines (EGA) or 50 lines (VGA). Only operational if you have an EGA or VGA display adapter. Alt F9 Set file date/time. Prompts for new date and time for marked files. Uses the system date and time by default. Alt F10 Creates an archive file (e.g. ZIP file) from marked files using a command line specified through DFCONFIG. RShift F10 Secondary 'Create Archive' key Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 20 Ctrl F Toggle display of directories in listing on/off Alt F11, Ctrl L Edit Volume name of source Volume. Alt F12, Ctrl P Prints the source directory listing to your printer. Ctrl W Send Form-feed to printer Ctrl Z Show Help screen. View Commands ------------- <Enter> (i.e. the <Enter> key on the central portion of the keyboard). or If file highlighted: SmartView uses the external viewer Ctrl V specified for the extension of the highlighted file. If the extension is not defined, the default viewer is used. If directory highlighted: Change to highlighted directory (i.e. make it the source). Grey <Enter> (i.e. the <Enter> key on the numeric keypad) or If file highlighted: Force default viewer. Ctrl <Enter> If directory highlighted: As above. Note: The function of the <Enter> and Grey<Enter> keys can be exchanged through the SmartViewers setting in DFCONFIG. F12 Use Secondary Viewer. or Ctrl B Attribute Commands ------------------ Alt A Add Archive bit Ctrl A Remove Archive bit Alt R Add Read-Only bit Ctrl R Remove Read-Only bit Alt H Add Hidden bit Ctrl H Remove Hidden bit Alt Y Add System bit Ctrl Y Remove System bit User-defined Commands --------------------- Ctrl-F1 through Ctrl-F12, RShift-F1 through RShift-F6, RShift-F11, RShift-F12 plus external file viewers. The two Create Archive functions can also be customized. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 21 Internal Viewer commands ------------------------ These commands are ONLY applicable when using internal viewer W Toggle word wrap/horizontal scroll. The startup status of this toggle can be set through a patch location. A Toggle ASCII string display. B Toggle blanking of non-ASCII characters. Grey * Toggle WordStar bit mask (shift non-ASCII high-order characters (from 128 to 255) down into the displayable ASCII range of 1 to 127. In addition, the cursor control keys act as you would expect. The <Enter> key duplicates the <PgDn> key. 4.0 Program Feature Information --------------------------------- The following sections describe some of Directory Freedom's main features and compatibility with environments such as networks and windowing systems. 4.1 Internal Viewer --------------------- (Note that this section applies ONLY if an external file viewer is NOT configured as your main and/or secondary default viewer. The internal viewer obviously has a speed and size advantage over external viewers - especially on a floppy disk system. On the other hand, an external viewer such as Vern Buerg's LIST can have a much wider array of features (e.g. text searching). DF is shipped with the internal viewer preconfigured although the user can, of course, change this easily by adding a command line such as LIST ~ from within the DFCONFIG program.) Just as pressing <Enter> lets you view a new directory, pressing <Enter> when a filename is highlighted lets you view the contents of the file. In the default mode the display is wrapped at the edge of the screen if a line is more than 80 characters wide. This option can be toggled by pressing W. Display of non-ASCII characters can be toggled with the ASCII and Blank options by pressing A or B. In ASCII mode only strings of 5 or more normal ASCII characters (including tab or space) are displayed. This is useful for viewing the messages contained in an .EXE or .COM file. With the Blank option, non-ASCII characters are replaced with a blank or space. A final option, Grey *, masks the high-order bit of non-ASCII characters to make WordStar files readable. The startup status of the Word-wrap bit can be swapped with a patch. See Appendix E. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 22 4.2 Shell functions and SmartViewers -------------------------------------- DF allows the user to significantly build on the internal program functions by accessing external programs in a variety of useful ways. While this functionality has existed in DF from the start (in fact, it was the major new feature of DF 1.0), with version 4.0 I added a wide new array of methods to access external programs. User-defined functions ---------------------- Up to 16 (or 20 if the F11/F12 keys are enabled) external shell functions can be assigned to the CONTROL-F1 through CONTROL-F10 and RShift-F1 through RShift-F6 keys. (Why not all the RShift keys, you ask? Answer: I'm reserving the rest of the RShift keys for DF's own use in future versions.) Functions such EDIT and UNARCHIVE can be added to the user-defined menus to correspond with the programs which you use, not to some arbitrary set of functions which I've set up. To illustrate the use of these functions, DF comes configured with a few typical external programs predefined, but these can be easily added to or changed through the use of the DFCONFIG program. (Those of you wondering how someone could ever have a need for this many user-defined functions might want to take a look at Appendix A which contains some of the clever things which users have done with these functions.) An important note: The user-defined functions (and SmartViewers) depend on external DOS programs. If a defined program cannot be found (either by specifying its full path in the command line or by placing it in a directory contained in your DOS PATH), the corresponding user-defined function will not work. Viewers ------- DF has both default viewers and SmartViewers. If you wish, the main default viewer can be left in its shipped configuration of using DF's internal viewer. Alternatively, a program such as Vern Buerg's LIST or PC Magazine's SMOOTH can be substituted by entering the appropriate command line for the default viewer in DFCONFIG. (For example, to use LIST, enter LIST ~ as the default viewer command line.) The default viewer will be used to examine the contents of the highlighted file if 1) the file's extension has not been configured for a SmartViewer or 2) one of the default viewer override keys (e.g. Ctrl <Enter>) have been pressed. SmartViewers allow you to automatically use the external viewer most appropriate to a given file's type (as reflected in its extension). For example, you can configure ZR (the author's ZIP file viewer) for files with a .ZIP extension and a program such as VGIF or VPIC for a file with a .GIF extension. As with all the other user-defined functions, customizing the settings for your personal preferences is Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 23 easy with DFCONFIG. Each SmartViewer command line can have up to three corresponding extensions defined. Single character wildcards (i.e. ?) are allowed. (Multiple character wildcards, i.e. *, are not supported.) For example, a multi-purpose graphics viewer such as VPIC might have a command line and extensions line which looks like the following: Command Line: VPIC ~ Extensions: GIF PCX RLE (Hint: If you require more than the allowed three extensions, just replicate the command line and define additional extensions which correspond to the replicated command line.) In addition to the main default viewer and Smartviewers, a secondary default viewer (accessible through the F12 key or Ctrl B) was added in version 4.50. The purpose of this viewer is to permit easy access to a viewer which is used frequently but which does not correspond to specific file extensions. For example, you might want to leave the internal viewer configured as the main viewer because of its speed, but assign a more fully-featured external program to the secondary viewer. Run a Program ------------- The Run-a-Program function (Alt-F5) allows you to run an executable program from within DF. The program under the highlight bar will be executed when you press this key combination. You will then be prompted for the command-line parameters to pass to the executing program. Press <Esc> to abort the operation or <Enter> to continue without parameters. Use this option with caution on programs you haven't tried out before. For one thing, DF has no way of testing a program's memory requirements. If a program doesn't do its own testing it may hang your system. Also, some programs seem to be allergic to being run in shells. NEVER execute a Terminate-And-Stay-Resident (TSR) program from a shell. You'll end up creating a hole in memory which will, at the least, cause you to lose memory and, at worst, will cause a system crash. DOS Shell --------- The DOS Shell (Alt-F2) allows you to temporarily exit to DOS. You should be able to do anything in this shell which you would normally do from the DOS command line subject to the constraint that the DF parent is using between 35 KB and 100 KB of memory. Type EXIT at the DOS prompt to return to DF. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 24 4.3 Attribute Functions ------------------------- DF incorporates functions which allow you to add or remove file attributes. The ALT-attribute functions allow you to set attribute bits while the CTRL-attribute functions allow you to remove the bits. The A, R, H, and Y keys control the Archive, read-Only, Hidden, and System bits respectively. (An S-key would have conflicted with the sort function, so the system attribute was assigned a different key since it will be seldom used anyway.) In general, attribute functions can be performed using standard marking just like all other functions. The exception is un-hiding hidden files. Hidden files can be unhidden one-by-one, but hidden files cannot be marked. This is because the ability to mark must carry over to all program functions and I thought that, in general, users would want hidden files to be automatically skipped since most DF functions are illegal on hidden files. (On a broader note, DF intentionally forces a few extra steps to delete or otherwise disrupt both Read-Only and Hidden files. I believe that this philosophy represents reasonable, if conservative, practice. Files are generally made Hidden or Read-Only for a reason and, therefore, I don't believe it should be too easy to tamper with them.) 4.4 Mouse Support ------------------- As of Revision 4.0, DF directly incorporated mouse cursor emulation (prior versions required a companion memory-resident program, DFM). This mouse cursor emulation provides the following: Mouse up/down movements emulate <up arrow> and <down arrow> Mouse left button emulates <Enter> Mouse right button emulates <esc> Mouse middle button (if present) emulates <space> In addition to using the mouse in the main directory listing, the Mouse button emulation is also active in the internal viewer. I realize that the above mouse support is relatively limited. I do not, however, have plans to significantly increase the level of this support since I believe that doing so would tend to decrease the ease-of-use of DF from the keyboard. In DF 4.50, the mouse initialization code was changed to do a mouse software reset rather than a hardware reset. This lets DF start up quite a bit faster on some systems. If this change causes you any problems, see Appendix E for "undocumented" patch location information. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 25 4.5 Network Support --------------------- Directory Freedom has been tested with a variety of networks including Novell Netware, FTP Systems' PC/TCP running idrive, Lantastic, and Data General PC*I running the MS-NET redirector without any problems. Of course, networked drives typically impose some restrictions on what the PC can do -- such as changing volume labels. Any such limitations will apply to DF as well. There is one "feature" of Netware of which you may want to be aware. Unless the Netware configuration file (SHELL.CFG) contains the line DOTS=ON, you will not see the .. which indicates the parent directory under DOS and within DF. This is a function of the way Netware interacts with DOS system calls and has nothing to do with DF. Realizing that many users are not in a position where they can change their network server configuration, I've added a shortcut key to DF which lets you move to the parent directory more easily -- the Backspace. Note, however, that this shortcut emulates doing an F9 (Change Directory) and typing .. ; therefore it does not preserve the cursor location when you pop up a level. 4.6 About Configuration Files ------------------------------- By default, DF will happily go on its way using the configuration information stored within its own program file (DF.COM) whether that information consists of the defaults the program with which was shipped or new settings stored directly to the program file by DFCONFIG. There may even be a slight startup speed advantage to doing things this way since there's no configuration file to read when initializing. Because of virus concerns, however, some users may prefer not to write to an executable program file (like DF.COM). In fact, resident virus detection software might well trigger when DFCONFIG tries to modify DF.COM unless you've told the virus software to ignore modifications to that file. For this reason (in part) DF allows for the use of configuration files. Section 5.2 tells you how to go about creating an initial configuration file if you don't already have one (since DF does not ship with such a file, seeing as how it isn't needed and can be easily constructed from the program file). Once you've got a configuration file, however, what determines if or how DF uses it? Here's the scoop: If you've modified DF.COM with the "Disable CFG Read" option, no-way no-how are you going to convince DF to read a configuration file until you've changed this. See Section 5.6. Assuming you haven't so disabled the use of configuration files, DF will, on startup, look in the directory containing the executing copy of DF for a file called DF.CFG. If there is, it will use that configuration file's settings to override those stored in the executable. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 26 If you use the /C command line switch (e.g. /Cdft.cfg -- note no spaces), DF will instead look for the configuration file pointed to on the command line. 4.7 System Information Screen ------------------------------- The components of the System Information Screen (Alt F7) are described in hideous techno-weenie detail in Appendix F. This section just gives a brief overview of the type of information shown and the philosophy behind the choice of information. The major components of the system information screen are as follows: CPU type, frequency, and floating point unit type System memory totals, allocation, and drivers DF memory utilization BIOS copyright information Sound board information DOS, memory manager, and windowed environment information Hardware summary DIsk drive information Video summary Directory Freedom 4.60 Copyright 1992 Gordon Haff and Bit Masons Consulting System Information Screen Press <esc> or <space> to return ┌───────────CPU──────────┬────────DOS────────┬────────────Disks ────────────┐ │ CPU: 80386 Step: D0+ │ DOS version: 5.00 │ Logical Drives │ │ Running at 19.8 MHz │ 12-17-92 1:42a │ ABCDEFGHIJ │ │ NDP: none │ Environ 399/ 800 │ CMOS Information │ ├─────────Memory─────────┤ Files 80 Buf 20 │ A: 1.2MB 5¼ │ │ KB Total Free │ Verify N Break N │ B: 1.44MB 3½ │ │ Convl 640 569 │ Win N DV N │ Type HD1: 1 HD2: 0 │ │ EMS 4.0 7,504 3,520 │ QEMM 6.03 │ │ │ Extnd 7,168 ├──────Hardware─────┤ D Drive letter │ │ XMS 3.00 3,520 │ Bus ISA │ DRIVE D Volume Label │ │ XMM driver 6.03 │ Mouse Y │ 2E2B-1CE1 Serial # │ │ HMA used 16K free │ 101-key Supprtd Y │ Fixed Type │ │ │ Kybd Present Y │ 2,048 Cluster size │ │ DF Program 32KB Conv │ │ 133,920,768 Total space │ │ Directry 63KB XMS │ LPT1 3BCh │ 8,390,656 Free space │ │ for shell 537 KB │ LPT2 278h │ │ ├──────────BIOS──────────┤ LPT3 not present │ L/R cursor keys cycle disks │ │12/15/89 (C)1987, Americ│ ├────────────Video─────────────┤ │an Megatrends Inc.All ri│ COM1 3F8h 16450 │ Active: VGA + analog color │ ├───────── Sound─────────┤ COM2 not present │ Inactive: MDA + 5151 (mono) │ │ SBlaster Y 220h │ COM3 not present ├──────────────────────────────┘ │ Adlib Y │ COM4 not present │ └────────────────────────┴───────────────────┘ Figure 2. Sample System Information Screen. This screen comes from a 386-25 running under DOS 5.0. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 27 You may cycle through the logical drive table (less drives A and B) by pressing the <Left arrow> and <Right arrow> keys. Using the Ctrl <Left arrow> and Ctrl <Right arrow> keys includes drives A and B. (You will of course get an error if there's no disk in a floppy drive when you try to access it.) The philosophy behind the information presented is to provide a useful single-page summary of the system information of most concern to users. I've tried to address both the cases where the system being examined is the user's regular system and the cases where the utility is being used to examine an system with the intent of figuring out what it is. The philosophy is not to replace the rich set of dedicated system analysis utilities available in the market. While I will make reasonable efforts to keep abreast of hardware and software changes which affect the system information screen, DF revisions will not be driven by updates to this screen nor will the focus of DF switch to being a system information utility. 4.8 Ultravision Compatibility ------------------------------- Directory Freedom Revision 4.0 and later is compatible with Personics' Ultravision. Ultravision is a very nice program which allows for an expanded range of screen modes on EGA/VGA systems as well as providing for alternate palette sets. DF will respond to Ultravision in the following ways: If the screen mode is 80 columns by n rows (where n is any number), DF will come up in that mode, whether n is 25, 43, 50, 63, or whatever. The Swap Video Mode (Alt-F8) will, however, alternate between 25 lines and 43/50 lines only. If the screen mode is j columns by n rows (where j is any number not equal to 80 and n is any number), DF will come up in 80 column by 25 row mode. The Swap Video Mode will work as above. In all cases, DF will, upon exit, restore the screen to whatever mode was in effect on entry. In other words, DF can display any number of rows but requires an 80 column display and will act accordingly. 4.9 DESQview and Microsoft Windows Compatibility -------------------------------------------------- As of version 4.60, Directory Freedom is a DESQview-aware application. DF will detect whether DESQview (or DESQview/X) is running and, if it is, will make the appropriate function calls to assign an alternate video buffer address if required. DF will also relinquish time slices while in keyboard polling loops for more efficient multitasking operation. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 28 In addition, the LShift key can be substituted for the Alt key as the "hot-key" for the secondary menu since holding down the Alt key is the default mechanism for popping up the DESQview menu. Microsoft Windows does not require specific "awareness" in the same way as DESQview. However, also as of version 4.60, DF will detect the presence of Windows and release idle time slices in the same manner as for DESQview. (DF is hardly a Windows application. In fact, it has none of the characteristics of a typical Windows application -- it's small and efficient and doesn't require a 50MHz 486 for acceptable performance. However, many users setup DF on their Windows desktop to perform most of their file management tasks since it's faster and quicker to use than any Windows-based file managers they've run across.) 5.0 Customization ------------------- User customization is carried out through the DFCONFIG program which is menu driven and includes its own help screens. DFCONFIG version 4.60 can read and write version 4.60 DF.COM files and can read version 4.50 DF.COM files. (It can probably write DF.COM 4.50 files without problems also, but this has not been qualified.) DF.CFG files are compatible between version 4.60 and 4.50. DFCONFIG version 4.50 can be used with version 4.50 files only. 5.1 DFCONFIG Command Line --------------------------- There are three possible permutations of the DFCONFIG command line: a) DFCONFIG If you do not specify a path and filename on the DFCONFIG command line, DFCONFIG assumes that the program you wish to modify is called DF.CFG and is in the current directory. The current configuration settings will be initially read from this file and any modifications made will be saved to this file. If DF.CFG cannot be found, DF.COM is searched for. If that cannot be found, DFCONFIG terminates with an error message. b) DFCONFIG [[path\]filename] The specified filename will be used for both input and output as specified in a). The path is optional if DFCONFIG and the .COM or .CFG file are in the same directory. c) DFCONFIG [[path\]in_file] [[path\]out_file] The current configuration settings will be read from in_file. Any modifications will be saved to out_file. As for b), the path is optional if everything is in the same directory. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 29 If you do specify any path\filename(s) on the command line, you must give a full legal pathname from either the current directory or a root and the full filename with extension. This allows you to use any names you desire for DF and/or its configuration files. (You must maintain either the .COM or .CFG extensions, however.) Note that in_file and out_file can be either DF.COM or DF.CFG files in any combination. 5.2 Creating a Configuration File ----------------------------------- To create a configuration file, follow the following steps (or, once you figure out their purpose, embellish them as you see fit): Change to a directory which contains DFCONFIG.EXE and DF.COM Type DFCONFIG DF.COM DF.CFG (where DF.CFG is the name of the configuration file you wish to create) Type Y when the program asks you if you want to create a configuration file Save and Quit from the main DFCONFIG menu You now have a configuration file. If you used the name DF.CFG and leave it in the same directory as the copy of DF.COM which you intend to run, it will be used automatically. If you've named it YUH459X6.CFG, that's fine too, but you'll have a hard time remembering that name when you use the /C switch on the DF command line. If you've tried to use anything other than a .CFG extension DFCONFIG has probably dutifully stopped you; if not, it still won't work. 5.3 DFCONFIG Usage Notes -------------------------- A mouse is supported in DFCONFIG's menus. The <Left Mouse Button> button is equivalent to <ENTER> on the keyboard, the <Right Mouse Button> button to <ESC>. If you make changes to DF's parameters, make sure that you tell DFCONFIG to save them; i.e. changes are not automatically saved. DFCONFIG modifies DF.COM by making changes to the memory image of the program, and then saving the memory image back to disk if told to save the changes thereby overwriting the original. This modification procedure may alert certain anti-viral programs such as Flushot+ and will alter the CRC (Cyclic Redundancy Check) value of the DF.COM file. Starting with version 4.50, a configuration file may be used in place of direct modification of the program file. DFCONFIG cannot work on a DF.COM file that has been compressed with a program such as LZEXE or PKLITE. DF.COM is compatible with these programs, but it cannot be modified in its compressed state since DFCONFIG depends on data being in specific locations in the program. (Don't even think about compressing DF.CFG since then neither DF.COM or DFCONFIG.EXE will be able to read it.) Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 30 DFCONFIG is compatible with Ultravision from Personics. If Ultravision is detected, DFCONFIG will set an 80x25 screen mode, but will restore the initial screen dimensions upon exit. If you have a monochrome monitor attached to a graphics card (CGA/EGA/VGA), DFCONFIG will automatically map the screen colors to their monochrome equivalents (with minor changes to make it easier to recognize the "quick selection characters" in the menus). The best results may be obtained, however, if you issue the "MODE MONO" command prior to invoking DFCONFIG. 5.4 DFCONFIG Main Menu ------------------------ Attributes: Accesses the Attributes sub-menu for changing DF settings such as color and Printer Port. This menu item is described in detail in Section 5.6. Commands: Accesses the Commands sub-menu which allows the specification of user functions such as SmartViewers. This menu item is described in detail in Section 5.5. Help Screen File: Reads in a plain text (i.e. ASCII) help screen to replace the one which DFCONFIG has read in from a DF.COM or configuration file along with the other settings Info: Gives registration information. Registration Form: An easy way to enter your information and print a registration form for DF. Filenames: Allows the current in_file or out_file to be changed. See Section 5.7 for additional information. Save and Quit: Saves the current settings in memory to the current out_file. These settings could have been read in from another copy of DF and/or could have been entered by the user through the Attributes and Commands sub-menus. Quit w/o saving: Quit the program without making any alterations to the out_file. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 31 5.5 Commands Modification --------------------------- DFCONFIG can be used to modify the user-defined shell functions accessed by the following menus: Control Keys (Ctrl F1 through Ctrl F10) Right Shift Keys (RShft F1 through RShft F6) Extended Keys (Ctrl and RShft F11 and F12) Viewers (SmartViewers and default viewers) More SmartViewers (What do you think?) Archivers (Command line used by 'Create Archive' functions) See Appendix D for the edit keystrokes used in these data entry screens. At the simplest level, the shell functions can merely be used to run an external program with no arguments (or at least no variable arguments). Thus, if you had a program called CPUTYPE which you would ordinarily run just by typing: CPUTYPE at the DOS prompt, you would just enter the same thing as one of the command lines within the DFCONFIG commands modification screen. There may indeed be situations where you want to access such a program from within DF, however, this usage does not take full advantage of the DF user-defined shell feature. Since the DF highlight cursor is always resting on a file or directory, it might seem useful to be able to pass that information to a shell command line. DF can do exactly this. By entering a ~ (tilde) as part of a defined command line in DFCONFIG, the user tells DF to "Insert the full path and filename of the file or directory under the highlight at this spot in the command." For example: The syntax to start Qedit with a file to edit is: Q [path\]filename In DFCONFIG, Q ~ will start Qedit with the highlighted file. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 32 Command-line syntax ------------------- In addition to the aforementioned tilde, a variety of other parameters are available to increase the flexibility of the user-defined command lines. %n Synonym for ~. This parameter is replaced with the full drive:path\filename of the highlighted file. (e.g. c:\util\df.txt) %d Source drive (e.g. c:) %p Source pathname (e.g. c:\work) [Versions before 4.60 included a trailing \ for this parameter -- and, unfortunately, a second one for good luck if you were pointing to the root directory] %c Target drive (note that since DF makes the target path the current DOS path, the default path on the target drive is the same as the target path) %f Highlighted filename only (e.g. df.txt). This differs from %n in that drive and path information is not included. %b Highlighted "base" filename only (e.g. df) %e Highlighted extension only (e.g. txt) [This corrects information in previous versions of this manual which indicated that the parameter included the leading period.] ` Synonym for ` (grave, i.e. the backwards accent under the tilde on most keyboards). This allows for the runtime insertion of parameters. The user is prompted for the input to this field. More than one grave may be placed on a command line, but the user will only be prompted one time and the input will be replicated. %% Literal % Example ------- All the above is really a whole lot more complicated to read than it actually is to do, so let's go through an example. Let's suppose that we want to define a key for Phil Katz's PKUNZIP program which views or extracts the archives found on many electronic bulletin board systems. Although we would normally set this program up on two different keys (one to view and one to extract), let's assume for the purposes of the example that this is a seldom used function and we only want to use one key for it. We go into DFCONFIG and the Commands menu. We then enter the desired command line. (We'll assume we're programming CTRL-F3): The usual syntax for PKUNZIP is something along the lines of: PKUNZIP [options] [path\]filename Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 33 In DFCONFIG, entering PKUNZIP ` ~ for the command line will prompt you to input the option you want, for example, -v if you want to view the highlighted ZIP file or -e if you want to extract the highlighted ZIP file. Enter whatever you like for the command line's menu name - it's only for your own reference. Don't worry about the Pause?, Refresh?, and Multi? fields for now. They're described later. We save the modified data entry screen with a <CTRL-Enter>, return to the main menu, and choose Save and Quit from the main DFCONFIG menu. When we next run DF, you'll notice that, when pressing the Control key, the new item has been added to the menu. ╔═<Esc> to abandon changes, Ctrl<Enter> to save════════════════════════════════╗ ║ Pause? ║ ║ Command Field Description Refresh? ║ ║ Multi? ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F1 q ~ Edit (Qedit) N Y N ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F2 arj e ~ Extract ARJ Y Y Y ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F3 pkunzip ~ Extract ZIP Y Y Y ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F4 nd ~ Name -> Date Y Y Y ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F5 fv ~ Archive View Y N Y ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F6 N N N ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F7 These definitions N N N ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F8 are examples only N N N ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F9 and require other N N N ║ ║ ║ ║ Ctrl-F10 software to work N N N ║ ╚══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝ Figure 3. Data entry screen for main user-defined menu. We now select a file to operate on. Just move the cursor down until the desired file is highlighted and, while holding down the Control key, press F3. DF will prompt you to enter parameters. Let's assume you want to view the archive. In this case, type -v and then hit the <Enter> key. If the highlighted file were called ARCHIVE.ZIP and was in the DOWNLOAD directory on the C: drive, DF would expand the command line to the following: PKUNZIP -V C:\DOWNLOAD\ARCHIVE.ZIP Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 34 Archiver Command ---------------- The default command line for the main archiver is: pkzip -ao @dfzip998 ' The @dfzip998 refers to a temporary file which DF creates to hold the filenames to be archived. You shouldn't mess with this. The -ao switch creates an archive, the time/date stamp of which is equal to the time/date stamp of the most recent file in the archive as opposed to the current time/date. (Using the -a switch instead would cause the current date to be used.) The ' (grave or back-quote) in the command line prompts you to enter the name of the archive file you wish to create. You can combine the name with any additional switches you wish to add to the process. (Of course if there are different switch settings which you use all the time, you will probably want to modify the command line in DFCONFIG. Other command line controls --------------------------- The Pause? value is asking whether you want a "Press any key to return" after exiting the program. You probably don't want a pause for things such as editors and do for programs which place information on the screen without inserting their own pause before exiting. The Refresh? value is asking whether you want DF to reread the directory before returning from the shell. You will generally want to set this value to 'Y' when performing functions such as extracting archives. There is a minimal performance penalty attached to performing such a reread on hard disks unless the directories are very large. If a function is regularly used on a floppy diskette directory, however, you may wish to perform Rereads manually (Alt-F4) only when you need them. Refresh will wipe out any file markings. The Multi? value is asking whether or not you want the function to operate on Marked files (if any exist) or the highlighted file. If Multi? is set to 'N', the function will operate only on the currently highlighted file - whether or not other files in the directory are highlighted. If Multi? is set to 'Y', the function will operate SEQUENTIALLY on the marked files in the directory (or the highlighted file if no files are marked). The Multi switch is not available for viewers. In the customization screen, you save your work by either typing CTRL-<Enter> at any point, or <Enter> when positioned on the last field of the screen. Exiting with <Esc> DOES NOT SAVE THE CONTENTS OF THE SCREEN! All the movement and edit commands for the data screen are available through on-line help in DFCONFIG. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 35 5.6 Attributes Modification ----------------------------- In addition to DF screen colors (NORMAL, INTENSE, MENU, MENU2, BORDER, and INVERSE), the following attributes can be changed by the DFCONFIG program: Switch [Default: / (Standard DOS) Snow check [Default: Off] Sort Default [Default: Ascending Name order] Verify Default [Default: Floppy only] Beep tone [Default: Standard DOS Beep] Extended Keyboard [Default: Auto] SmartViewer Key [Default: <Enter>] Secondary Menu Key [Default: Alt] Mouse [Default: Enable] Startup Video Mode [Default: 25 lines] Exclude Attributes [Default: N for all attributes] Printer Port [Default: LPT1] Disable CFG Read [Default: No] Drive Table [Default: empty] Drive Table Keys [Default: left/right arrow] Memory Allocation [Default: Try XMS,EMS, and large Conventional] Each of these options are explained below. ╔═Edit Attributes═════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗ ║ ║ ║ ║ ║ ╔══════════════════════╗ ║ ║ ║ Color ║ ║ ║ ║ Switch ║ Directory of C:\TC ║ ║ ║ Snow Check ║ Example of Intense ║ ║ ║ Sort Default ║ ║ ║ ║ Verify Default ║ Filename Ext 45678 ║ ║ ║ Beep Default ║ FILENAME EXT 6478 ║ ║ ║ Extended Keyboard ║ 89098765 ABC 123098 ║ ║ ║ SmartViewer key ╔════════════╗ AUTOEXEC BAT 13818 ║ ║ ║ Secondary Menu Ke║ Normal ║ INVERSE 0 ║ ║ ║ Mouse ║ Intense ║ GORDONHA FF 76438 ║ ║ ║ Startup Video Mod║ Menu ║ ║ ║ ║ Exclude Attribute║ Border ║ ┌────────────────┐ ║ ║ ║ Printer Port ║ Inverse ║ Sample of ║ ║ ║ Disable CFG read ║ 2nd Menu ║ MENUS/BORDER ║ ║ ║ Drive Table ╚════════════╝ └────────────────┘ ║ ║ ║ Drive Table Keys ║ ║ ║ ║ Memory Allocation ║ ║ ║ ║ Return to Menu ║ ║ ║ ╚══════════════════════╝ ║ ║ ║ ╚═════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝ Figure 4. Attributes modification menu showing color modification sub-menu. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 36 Color ----- Both the foreground and background settings of the six color combinations used in DF can be modified through DFCONFIG's Attribute modification. To aid you in this process, a sample color screen changes dynamically based on the currently set and currently highlighted colors. Switch ------ / ("Standard" DOS switch) - ("UNIX" switch) For the UNIX hackers, the switch character is used to identify an option entered on the DOS command line when you first call up DF. Normally this is '/', so that options would be specified by /d or /o. By changing the byte to '-', options can be entered as -d or -o. This lets you use '/' in your path names, so that instead of entering command lines like: DF C:\COMM\DOWN D:\UTIL /D You can now enter: DF C:/COMM/DOWN D:/UTIL -D or DF C:\COMM\DOWN -d D:\UTIL or DF -d C:/COMM\DOWN D:/UTIL -D But not: DF C:\COMM\DOWN D:/UTIL /D (This will confuse DF) (Note that since the confusion results from the option switch, and since there are no options entered with pathnames once the program is running, you can use either / or \ as a path delimiter when entering a destination or changing the path with F9 or F10 keys.) Snow Check ---------- Yes No When DF starts up it determines the primary display type and if it is monochrome, EGA, or VGA, snow checking is neither performed nor necessary. If it is not one of those, then DF can query the display adapter before writing to the display memory to see if it is OK to do so. This procedure is necessary to avoid spurious dots or "snow" on old IBM Color Graphics Adapters (CGAs) caused by the CPU and the display circuitry simultaneously accessing the video buffer. Unfortunately, this check also slows down the display quite a bit. If snow checking is specified by the command line switch /F, the default setting is overridden. (It's unlikely you'll ever need to use this setting unless you have one of the original "true Blue" IBM PC's.) Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 37 Sort Option ----------- Name Extension Size Date Attribute Original A new default sort key and order can be chosen from within DFCONFIG. The choices (Name, Extension, Size, Date, Attribute, and Original) are the same as those which can be specified on either the DF command line or by pressing the appropriate Alt- or Ctrl-key. If a sort order is specified as a command line switch, this default setting is overridden. If (O)riginal is chosen, no sort takes place and the filenames are displayed in the same order as they are displayed when typing the 'dir' command at the DOS prompt. Other choices (e.g. (N)ame) bring up a secondary menu which asks you to specify (A)scending or (D)escending. You can use the sort menu to specify a sort order for each primary key (except for (O)riginal). This sort order will be used as the command-line default if you specify a primary key but not an order suffix. (In other words, if you specify a sort key but no order on the command line, (e.g. /D) whether the sort takes place in ascending or descending order will be a function of what you set up in this menu item.) If (N)ame, (E)xtension, or A(t)tribute is chosen, the sort is in ascending (i.e. alphabetical) order by default. If (S)ize is chosen, the sort is in descending order by default to allow for more efficient packing when copying to multiple floppy diskettes. (D)ate also sorts in descending order by default to place the most recently created or modified files at the top of the directory listing. DF automatically uses a logical secondary key and secondary key order for each primary key sort. The identity and sort order of this secondary key is not configurable. Press <esc> from the primary sort key menu to return to the main attributes menu. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 38 Verify Default -------------- No Change Yes No Floppy Only From the DOS command line, you can type VERIFY ON or VERIFY OFF to change DOS's write-verify status. If Verify is on, MS-DOS performs a series of checks following each disk-write operation to attempt to verify that the data just written can be read without error. The downside of such checking is that write operations are slowed down significantly and the enhanced security provided by VERIFY ON is questionable, at least with hard disks. In any case, DFCONFIG allows the write-verify status within DF to be set in one of four different ways. It can be set ON, in which case all affected DF commands will operate with write-verify status enabled. It can be set OFF, in which case all affected DF commands will operate with write-verify status disabled. It can be set to NO CHANGE, in which case DF will use the write-verify status which was in use by DOS prior to running DF. Or it can be set to FLOPPY ONLY in which case verify is set on if the target is a floppy diskette and set off otherwise. Using DF's /V command-line switch will force write-verify status ON no matter how this switch is set. Beep Default ------------ DOS Beep Beep 1 If an error is made when using DF (e.g. an illegal operation such as deleting a Read-only file is attempted), the program beeps to alert you of the error. By default, the standard DOS beep (ASCII 07) is used. Personally I find this standard tone very annoying and grating on the ear so DFCONFIG allows an alternative "soft beep" to be chosen instead. (This alternative tone is generated by programming the timer chip directly instead of using standard DOS or BIOS services. Therefore it may not work on some computers which are not 100% IBM PC/AT hardware compatible.) Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 39 Extended Keyboard ----------------- Yes No Auto On systems with extended keyboards (101-key or equivalent), selecting Yes will allow the user to program two additional function keys on the Control and RightShift menus (and use the function key commands Alt-F11 and Alt-F12). The status of this switch does NOT affect the ability to program these keys in the DFCONFIG command line editor. Unless this switch is set to Yes, however, those programmed keys cannot actually be used (nor will they be displayed) within DF. In revision 4.0, a new default setting (Auto) was added to this menu. The Auto setting attempts to automatically detect the presence of a BIOS which supports a 101-key keyboard. Unfortunately, this sort of detection is kind of a kludge and 101-key support will NOT be automatically detected on all systems. If automatic detection doesn't work on your system and you know that you have an extended keyboard BIOS (or memory resident software which emulates such a BIOS), just manually force the support by selecting "Yes". Simply having a 101-key keyboard does not guarantee that the BIOS of your system will support the extended function keys. If you do not have an extended keyboard BIOS, enabling F11/F12 may hang your system. SmartViewer Key --------------- <Enter> Grey<Enter> DF normally uses the <Enter> key on the main keypad as the SmartViewer key (i.e. the one which calls up user-defined viewers if an extension matches). Some people prefer to use the numeric keypad <Enter> key as their primary key. This switch lets them do that. Secondary Menu Key ------------------ Alt Left-Shift (i.e. the Shift key on the left side of the keyboard) This switch chooses the "hot-key" used to bring up the secondary menu of "hardwired" DF functions. (This is the menu which includes the Directory-specific functions and items such as "Run a Program.") The choice is offered because pressing and releasing the Alt key may also bring up the DESQView menu if DESQView is active. Since Alt has been the secondary "hot-key" in all versions of Directory Freedom to date, however, it has been left as the default for backward compatibility. Choosing Left-Shift as the hot-key will also lessen the chance of keystroke conflicts with memory resident programs. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 40 Mouse ----- Enable Disable By default, DF uses mouse cursor emulation if a mouse driver is detected. If you wish to disable this support for some reason, use this menu. Startup Video Mode ------------------ 25 line 43/50 line The setting of this item will determine whether your system starts up with a 25 row display or a 43 row (EGA) / 50 row (VGA) display. If you do not have an EGA or VGA display adapter, this switch setting will have no effect and you will start up with a 25 line display. Exclude Attributes ------------------ Read-Only Y/N Hidden Y/N System Y/N By default, DF will display all files in the Working (source) directory regardless of their file attribute bits. This menu item allows you to exclude the display of one or more of the "special" attribute settings. (There is also an archive bit which is most commonly used to handle backups as well as subdirectory and volume bits - the latter two are already handled in a special manner by DF.) If , for example, Read-Only were set to 'Y', files with a Read-Only bit would not be displayed by DF. This switch settings allows a person such as a PC manager to protect files which would be hidden from normal DOS displays or protected from normal DOS functions such as ERASE but which DF would normally display. Printer Port ------------ LPT1 LPT2 This item selects the printer port which will be used by the Print Directory Listing command. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 41 Disable CFG Read ---------------- Yes No Normally, DF searches for a DF.CFG file in its home directory if no configuration file is specified on the command line. If that search fails, the settings stored in DF.COM are used. If you definitely don't want to use configuration files, you can save a little time when DF starts up by disabling DF's search for a configuration file. Note that this setting is not stored in any configuration files created. Doing so wouldn't make sense since DF would see the setting too late to do any good. This setting is only stored when DFCONFIG saves directly to a DF.COM file. Drive Table ----------- The Drive Table is the list of drives which you can move among with the <left arrow> and <right arrow> keys from the main DF menu. By default, the table is empty. Fill it up with the drive letters you wish to add to the list unseparated by colons or spaces. For instance, entering CDEFG would allow you to move among those five drives. It is allowed (though not really recommended) to add floppy drives to the list. If DF.COM sees that the table is empty, by default it will use all logical drives on the system less A and B. If you want to tell DF that empty means empty, you may patch DF.COM per Appendix E. Drive Table Keys ---------------- Left/Right Arrow Control Left/Right Arrow By default, you move through the drive table with the left and right arrow keys. Some people have found that, especially on systems which use brain-damaged cursor key arrangements such as the Inverted-T, they hit these keys by accident rather too often. These folks can now optionally use the Control left/right arrow combination instead. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 42 Memory Allocation ----------------- XMS Y EMS Y Low (Large) Y Starting with version 4.60 of Directory Freedom, memory management has been rewritten to allow a full 64KB memory segment to be devoted to storing the displayed directory. This translates into about 1500 files. Earlier versions forced the directory to share its space with the program code which meant that only about half this number of files could be accommodated. This configuration item determines whether you use this new memory feature and, if so, whether you want to swap out the directory space to XMS or EMS when executing a user-defined command or otherwise shelling to DOS. If any of the above items are set to 'Y', DF will use the large directory space. If XMS is checked, DF will check for the presence of XMS memory and, if available, will swap the directory space to XMS memory on a shell. Ditto for EMS. If both XMS and EMS are set to 'Y', DF will first try to use XMS memory and will only do its thing with EMS if XMS is not available. If both XMS and EMS are set to 'N' (or if they are unavailable), DF will still use the large directory space but will not swap. If you're the tinkering type, you can see the effects of all this in the System Information Screen under DF Memory Usage. "Boy, that last paragraph was sure confusing!?! I wonder what I ought to do????" The simple answer to this is that you'll very rarely want to make any changes from the default settings. I can really only think of a couple of instances: If your system does not have XMS or EMS memory and you want to make about 30K more memory available for shells (in exchange for a smaller maximum directory size), set all options to 'N' (Rare) If, for some reason, your system is having problems with XMS or EMS swapping you may want to try turning the relevant option off. Note that DF automatically detects XMS and EMS memory availability. Setting, say, XMS to 'Y' only means that DF will try to use XMS for swapping. If it can't find XMS or there's no XMS free, no harm is done. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 43 5.7 Read Help Screen ---------------------- This menu item allows you to read in a plain ASCII text file as DF's help screen. When you read in a file in this manner, it will replace the current help text in DFCONFIG. The text file should consist of 18 lines with up to 77 characters each. (If it's bigger or has longer lines than this, fine -- but the preceeding is all that will get read in.) Important! The file must be a plain ASCII file. It cannot be formatted output from a word processor or the results will likely be spectacular but not very useful. Why would anyone want to do this? Again, I have a couple of reasons: You want to write a new help file with your favorite text editor and take advantage of all the text editor's features such as column moves and line drawing boxes You want to bring over user-defined commands and settings from an earlier revision of DF while also getting the help screen which came with the new version. The is actually the case when moving from DF 4.50 to 4.60 and, for this reason, the file DFHELP.TXT is supplied. See the installation section of this manual for upgrading instructions. 5.8 Filenames --------------- The Filenames item on the main menu allows you to specify new in_file and out_file names to replace those specified (or defaulted to) on the DFCONFIG command line. The filenames can be either entered directly or selected from a directory list of .COM or .CFG files. If filenames are entered manually, they must end in either a .CFG or a .COM extension which corresponds to their identity as configuration or program files. If a .CFG file which does not exist is specified as an out_file (either through this menu item or on the DFCONFIG command line, you will be asked whether you wish to create a new file. DFCONFIG will attempt to validate any selected files to ensure that they correspond to the proper format for the chosen file type. By necessity, however, the checking is limited to a search for certain coded strings which DFCONFIG inserts in .CFG files or which are present in .COM files. If the chosen file is corrupted in a more subtle way (for instance by manual editing outside of the DFCONFIG program), DFCONFIG may still think the file is valid when it is not. The results in such a case will be unpredictable. When a file is chosen for input, its contents will be read into DFCONFIG as the current settings as soon as you verify that the program should go ahead. When a new file is chosen for output, no writing takes place until DFCONFIG is exited through the "Save and Quit" item on the main menu. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 44 6.0 Companion Programs ------------------------ Bit Masons has written software which can be used in conjunction with DF. The main example of this is the X-Ray Viewers which, while they can also be used outside of DF from the DOS command line, are primarily intended to be used as SmartViewers from within DF. This companion software has been released by Bit Masons as "Freeware" and is not part of Directory Freedom. Those of you who order updates directly from the author will receive all Bit Masons companion programs together with the latest revision of Directory Freedom. In addition to software written in-house, Bit Masons also sells a companion disk of third-party software which many users find works well together with DF as SmartViewers and for other purposes. Bit Masons acts only as a distributor for this software. Most of it is shareware and must be registered with the individual authors per their license agreements if you use it. See the REGISTER.DOC file for information on ordering this disk. This third party software is also available from a variety of electronic sources and from disk vendors. 6.1 Bit Masons Programs ------------------------- X-Ray Viewers ------------- The X-Ray Viewers provide a scrollable environment for examining the contents of various types of archive files and allows the user to view those contents by piping them to LIST. In other words, you can read a text file contained within, for example, a .ZIP file without extracting the archive. In combination with the SmartViewer functions in DF, the X-Ray viewers make the examination of .ZIP, .ARJ, .LZH, and .ZOO files almost automatic (just highlight a file and press <Enter>). "Freeware" but requires the appropriate archive program and LIST to function. Latest revision: 1.02; Archive name: XRAY102 (XRAY.ZIP on Compuserve) Contains ARJ, ZIP, LZH, and ZOO viewers. See XR.TXT on the disk for more information. Subsumes ZR which was in turn a renaming of ZV. In the interests of providing an integrated environment for viewing archives, the X-Ray Viewers revision 1.02 are bundled with Directory Freedom revision 4.60. Since they are separate software, however, DF will not be automatically updated if new revisions of these viewers become available. Those who obtain their software from Electronic Bulletin Boards may therefore wish to download copies of XRAYxxx.ZIP when new revisions become available. Diskettes shipped by Bit Masons will always contain the most recent copies of the X-Ray Viewers. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 45 ND -- This program can be set to a user-defined function key and will rename the highlighted file to a new name which is derived from the current date. For example, FILENAME.TXT would be renamed to 891015.TXT if the date were Oct 15, 1989. It appends a letter to the base name (e.g. 891015A.TXT, 891015B.TXT, etc.) if the "dated name" already exists. I find this very useful for handling message-base files from BBS's. Version 2.00 adds a great deal of flexibility with command-line switches. ND is "Freeware." Latest revision: 2.0; Archive name: NAMD200.ZIP (ND200.ZIP on Compuserve) 6.2 Third-Party Programs -------------------------- As noted, some of these useful programs are included on the DF companion disk. Please check the README.DF file for the latest contents of this diskette. PRUNE ----- A Michael Mefford creation which appeared in PC Magazine is PRUNE. PRUNE shows two disk drives simultaneously and contains powerful functions for manipulating entire directory trees. An older Mefford program which fulfilled a similar function was RF. RF has not been updated for many years, however, and apparently has a variety of problems with high-capacity disks, DOS 5, and other recent additions to the PC world. I no longer recommend that RF be used in conjunction with DF. PRUNE is available on PCMAGNET and can be patched with the instructions in Appendix B. A pre-patched version with a couple of other changes to make calling DF easier is available on many BBS systems and the DF companion disk as DFPRUNE. SLED or TED or QEDIT or ... --------------------------- Since I do not want to start a religious war, I won't even begin to suggest which editor people should configure. SLED is a small shareware editor which many people like and is very sophisticated for its size. TED is a simple editor from PC Magazine which is free copyrighted software. While lacking such features as word-wrap, it is very compact (~ 12K bytes) and more than sufficient to edit batch files and perform similar tasks. QEdit is a very good shareware programmers' editor. Personally, I have my working copy of DF setup to use Multi-Edit (a programmer's editor). SLED is included on the companion disk. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 46 LIST ---- As mentioned earlier in this documentation, I recommend Vernon Buerg's LIST in place of the built-in file viewer for many applications. Vernon has been making significant enhancements to LIST recently and is well worth a look in the event you don't already have a copy. LIST is included on the companion disk. VPIC ---- VPIC will view many formats of graphics files (e.g. GIF and PCX) on a variety of graphics boards including most Super-VGA adapters. VPIC is well-suited for configuration as a SmartViewer against a range of graphics formats. VPIC is included on the companion disk. RVS --- RVS fulfills much the same function as the X-Ray Viewers. A single program can be used against a variety of archive formats to view their contents and view text files within the archive. RVS is somewhat more powerful than the X-Ray Viewers, but also takes more memory and isn't quite as fast. Which is best for you will depend on your requirements. Many users find it convenient to use the X-Ray Viewers as their SmartViewers while assigning RVS to a user-defined key. RVS is included on the companion disk 7.0 Technical and Sources --------------------------- DF was written using Borland's Turbo Assembler and Turbo Debugger 3.0. The vast bulk of the code is custom although some modified routines from Base Two's Spontaneous Assembler 2.0 libraries were also used. Multi-Edit 6.0 from American Cybernetics was used as an editor. DFCONFIG was compiled using Borland C++ 3.1 in conjunction with the TCXL rev 5.52 libraries. [A sidebar: TCXL was formerly Mike Smedley's CXL. The libraries were purchased by Innovative Data Concepts who now own the rights. IDC can be contacted at 215-443-9705.] Documentation was prepared using Ami Pro 3.0 and converted for the on-disk version with the aforementioned Multi-Edit. DF was developed on a homebrew 386 (named Dejah Thoris) based on an AMI 20MHz full-size motherboard with Micropolis 660MB ESDI disk and Ultrastore 12(F) ESDI controller. It is a dual monitor system with an Orchid Prodesigner 512KB VGA board and an IBM MDA board. The system runs DOS 5.0, QEMM, and Windows 3.1. While it is not possible to test with all possible configurations, test systems have included a DG/One 2T laptop, a DG Dasher/286 with EGA, and a DG/Dasher 386/25k with VGA. Testing included both DOS 3.3 and DOS 5.0. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 47 The following, in no particular order, are some of the sources and tools which have been helpful for the development of DF: Borland C++, Assembler, Debugger, and Profiler tools Innovative Data Concepts' Tesseract Development Tools Base Two's Spontaneous Assembly libraries American Cybernetic's Multi-Edit editor Lotus Development Corp.'s Ami Pro 3.0 Many Hax and articles from PC Techniques magazine The rich assortment of assembler code which (mostly used to appear) in PC Magazine together with much information from the back pages of same The Waite Group's MS-DOS Developer's Guide A VERY well-thumbed copy of Ralph Duncan's Advanced MS-DOS Michael Abrash's Zen of Assemby Language Peter Norton's Programmer's Guide to the IBM PC Richard Wilton's Programmer's Guide to PC and PS/2 Video Systems Phoenix Technology's System BIOS for IBM PC's, Compatibles, and EISA Computers Robert Hummel's Programmer's Technical Reference: The Processor and Coprocessor Microsoft Press's Microsoft Mouse Programmer's Reference Steve Grant's and Andrew Rossmann's InfoPlus program for which they generously make the sources available. Information in these sources contributed greatly to making the System Information screen possible. CPU frequency code adapted from ATPERF published by the late, lamented PC Tech Journal 386 Step detection from 386STEP.ASM, Jeff Proise PC Magazine 2/11/92 CPU code detection, including NEC variants, from PC Tech Journal 4/86 by Bob Smith with 486 detection from Hummel added 8.0 Acknowledgements ---------------------- For Directory Freedom 4.60, special thanks go to my beta testers: Don Dougherty, Mike Cromer, Rick Strom, Ron Lloyd, John Windhorst, and others. Blame me for any bugs you find, but rest assured that there would be many more without the efforts of these testers. I would also like to thank the many other users whose suggestions have contributed greatly to the advancement of DF and, of course, those who have registered their copies and made the Shareware concept work. In addition to the above testers, the "inhabitants" of the Ilink and RIME Shareware Relays have been especially forthcoming with many suggestions for improvements and new features. Finally, I would like to thank the sysops of my "home" BBS (Channel One), Brian Miller and Tess Hedder. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 48 DF 1.00 was based extensively on Peter Esherick's source code from DC rev 1.05b with the additional help of some code from Brad Stephenson's DR26 program. Peter has also been kind enough to share some DC code fixes with me for incorporation into DF. Peter can be contacted at the following: Albuquerque PC Users' Group Albuquerque RBBS 296-7672, John Maio, sysop ARPANET: esheric@SANDIA.GOV Steve Grandi of U. Arizona also contributed to DC and has made helpful suggestions for DF as well. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 49 9.0 Appendix A: User-defined Commands -------------------------------------- This section shows just a sample of some of the command lines which myself and other users of DF have come up with to make our computing a bit easier. As stated earlier, many of the programs listed in this Appendix are Shareware. As such, you can fully try out these programs (subject to the limitations, if any) in their individual license agreements. If you find them useful, however, you are expected to register them with the individual authors. Most of these programs should be readily available from private electronic bulletin boards, Information Services such as Compuserve, and disk vendors such as PC-SIG. If you can't find a particular program, I may be able to help, but some of the command lines in this Appendix were contributed by other users so I do not have all (or the latest versions of) some of the software listed here. Thanks to Don Dougherty, Robert Ramsdell, and Shakib Otaqui for contributing. Editors and Word Processors --------------------------- q ~ [Qedit] wp ~ [Word Perfect] Virus Detection --------------- chk4bomb ~|list/s scan ~ /nomem Listing Files ------------- These programs tend to have complicated switches; you may well want different settings than in these examples] 4print ~ -h -s [Print 2 to a page on Laserjet] lp ~ lpt1: /N /132 [Norton Line Print] Other ----- dirmatch %p %c [Look at source and target directories side by side] lzeshell ~ [Create compressed executable file] pkunzip ~ [Extract archive to default directory] pkunzip ~ s:\ [Extract archive to s: drive] 4dos [Execute 4DOS command shell] Viewers ------- list ~ [LIST for general-purpose viewer] zr ~ [ZR for .ZIP] vpic ~ [VPIC for .GIF] wpdraw ~ [Word Perfect Draw for .WPG] playrol ~ bank.bnk [Plays Adlib sound files (.ROL) with bank.bnk instrument file) Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 50 10.0 Appendix B: Patching Instructions --------------------------------------- This section describes how to patch PC Magazine's RN and PRUNE to call DF instead of the default DR. An alternate method of achieving the same effect is to rename DF.COM to DR.COM. The instructions in this section are valid as of the specified revs of the RN.COM and PRUNE.COM which were downloaded from Compuserve on 20 November 1990. This section is not intended to be a tutorial on patching programs. The changes detailed in this section can be made with any byte-level editor such as DISKEDIT or NU in the Norton Utilities or even DEBUG. As always, make sure that you have a backup of the original program before you start messing around with its bytes! RN.COM ------ Instructions apply to RN.COM, Revision 2.0 (4676 bytes). At offset 029Ah old: 52 2F 45 0D 00 new: 46 0D 00 00 00 At offset 043Bh old: 52 new: 46 The above changes alters DR references to DF and changes the command line which spawns DR/O to a command line which spawns DF with no arguments. PRUNE.COM --------- Instructions apply to PRUNE.COM, Revision 1.0 (7388 bytes). At offset 0093h: old: 52 new: 46 At offset 0633h: old: 52 new: 46 The above changes DR references to DF references. I also have patched versions of these programs which will call DF by pressing the <Enter> key. These patches required modification of the source code and, in the case of PRUNE, I will include it on any update disks I distribute. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 51 11.0 Appendix C: Site Licenses ------------------------------- Site Licenses are available for DF. The rates below are for a "basic" site license. This includes registration for the specified number of copies and support through a single specified individual. I will, however, be happy to address specific requirements such as update subscriptions and support through multiple persons. $40 1 registration with media, typeset manual and update $18 2-5 registrations $16 6-9 $14 10-19 $12 20-29 $10 30-99 $8 100 and up Unlimited $2,500 The above schedule means that the first copy is $40, the 2nd through 5th copies are $18, and so forth. (The exception is the unlimited license which represents the total license cost.) So, for example, 6 copies would cost $128 ($40 + 4x$18 + 1x$16). The table below lists the site license cost for a variety of user counts. My terms read support through a single person, though I'm flexible within reason. (i.e. I won't hang up the phone on anyone who isn't the "official" contact, but I would start to get unhappy if I were to start getting dozens of calls with setup questions.) Users Price Users Price 5 $112 40 $546 10 $190 50 $646 15 $260 60 $746 20 $328 70 $846 25 $388 80 $946 30 $446 90 $1,046 35 $496 100 $1,144 DF is currently licensed by a wide range of companies and government agencies. I'd like to add you to the list! For more information, contact Gordon Haff at: Bit Masons Consulting 3205 Windsor Ridge Dr. Westboro, MA 01581 Tele: (508) 898-3321 Compuserve: 72561,2637 Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 52 12.0 Appendix D: Keystrokes for Data-entry ------------------------------------------- LeftArrow cursor left RightArrow cursor right UpArrow cursor up DownArrow cursor down Ctrl-LeftArrow word left Ctrl-RightArrow word right Tab field right Shift-Tab field left Enter process field Ctrl-Enter process all fields Decimal (.) move to right side of decimal point Home beginning of field End end of field line / end of field Ctrl-Home beginning of first field Ctrl-End end of last field Ins toggle field insert mode Del delete character at cursor BackSpace delete character left Ctrl-BackSpace delete word left Ctrl-R restore field to original contents Ctrl-T delete word right Ctrl-U delete to end of field Ctrl-Y delete to end of last field Esc abort data entry Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 53 13.0 Appendix E: "Undocumented" Patches ---------------------------------------- Most DF user-definable switch settings can be altered quickly and easily through the companion DFCONFIG program. This appendix documents the DF.COM patch locations for values stored in DF which I do not anticipate most users having a need to alter (and as such are not settable through DFCONFIG). Each entry in this section describes allowable values for each patch location and what the values mean. It is assumed that any user wishing to do such patching has the appropriate software (DEBUG or a full-screen hex editor such as Norton Diskedit) and knows how to use it. As always, any changes should be made on a backup copy of DF.COM. Mouse_reset @ 002Dh (Byte) 0: [default] Use software reset 1: Use hardware reset (used in earlier revs of DF) This patch is provided in case the change to a software reset creates any incompatibilities. Such incompatibilities are not expected (and using a hardware reset is slower). DOS_version_check @ 002Ch (Byte) 0: [default] Check for DOS version. Abort if < 3.0. 1: Skip version check. If you wish to try running DF with DOS versions earlier than 3.0, you can try patching this location. No testing has been done, however, and it is likely that severe problems will be encountered in several areas of the program (possibly including initialization). The recommended solution to running with older versions of DOS (such as on older rev-locked hardware which cannot use standard Microsoft DOS) is to run an older version of DF which does not have code dependent on DOS 3-specific features. View_Flags @ 0026h (Byte) 1: [default] Wordwrap initially on for internal viewer 0: Wordwrap initially off The internal viewer flags are, by default, initialized with the WRAP_BIT (1) set. To startup the initial viewer with wordwrap set to off, set this byte to 0. Use_logical @ 0028h (Byte) 0: [default] If drive table empty, use logical drive table less A and B 1: If drive table empty, leave it empty (i.e. disable left/right arrow drive movement) By default, DF will fill in the drive table for you automatically if it isn't explicitly set through DFCONFIG. Patching this location disables this feature. Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 54 14.0 Appendix F: System Information Screen -------------------------------------------- This Appendix describes to a fairly grotesque level of technical detail what the system information screen is showing and how it arrived at some of the nonsensical numbers it displays (while conveniently forgetting to mention the random number generator). Somewhat seriously though, this Appendix is aimed at a fairly technical audience and assumes you know what things like the DOS Environment are together with other facts which make you an absolutely scintillating cocktail party guest. If you don't know about such things you may want to consider yourself lucky and move on to the next section. But anyway.... CPU --- CPU: Identifies the type of CPU. 80586 (i586) is not supported yet, nor does DF currently figure out the width of the memory bus (to distinguish, for example, between an 8088 and an 8086 or an 80386DX and an 80386SX). NEC V20's and V30's together with Intel 8018x's are supposedly detected as are 80486SX's as distinguished from DX's (486DX2's are not treated uniquely). 80386 chip steppings are detected as B0 or earlier, B1, and D0 or later. D0+ is good. Earlier steps had some bugs (See PC Mag 2/11/92). Cycle time is computed by timing a bunch of fixed point multiplies and making some adjustments for instruction overhead. The results have been pretty good across a range of machines tested though they aren't exact because of the effect of things like memory refresh, wait states, caches, etc. The code to do this was based on ATPERF from PC Tech Journal. (The results of this benchmark are not rounded the the probable "right" answer as an intentional design decision.) NDP: The type of numeric coprocessor is detected (including Weitek). Weitek detection is only done on an 80386 and is based on the state of bit 24 of eax as returned by INT 11h. Memory ------ Convl: Total and Free KB of Conventional (Low) memory. Total memory obtained from 040:13h. Available memory computed from offset 03h in the PSP. EMS: EMS revision number, Total, and Free KB of EMS memory. Obtained using various INT 67h calls. Extnd: Total extended memory. If you are running DOS 4 or later this is obtained from offset 45h in the List of Lists. If you are running DOS 3 it is obtained from an INT 15h call with ah = 088h (with the former being the more reliable method even though it uses an undocumented function call to obtain the List of Lists). Since "old style" extended memory was accessed in various and sundry Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 55 unconventional and documented ways, there is no way to really determine how much extended memory is in use outside of a specification such as XMS. XMS: XMS version number and Free KB of XMS memory. Obtained using XMS multiplex function calls. Duncan's Extending DOS is probably the best source for both EMS and XMS memory access information. XMM driver: The version number of the XMS memory driver. HMA: HMA is the famous 64KB high memory area which Microsoft "discovered" could be accessed in real mode by flipping the state of the A20 address line. Possible states are none, free, and used. If used, the amount free is given. (Theoretically the HMA can only be used by one program at a time but this "rule" is sometimes broken. Furthermore, if you have a choice of giving the HMA to one of two pieces of software such as DOS 5.0 and DESQview, amount free may give you an idea about how efficiently one program makes use of the available space relative to the other.) DF Program: The amount of conventional memory used by DF program code. DF Directory: The amount of memory taken up by the DF directory listing. The type of memory shown (XMS, EMS, or Conventional) is the type of memory being used by the directory when you have shelled out of DF to a user-defined command. The directory is always in conventional memory while DF is active (not shelled out). DF for shell: This is the amount of memory available for programs when you shell out of DF. (Actually, some of this space will be be taken up by the command interpreter you have defined with COMSPEC=) BIOS ---- The BIOS date is assumed to reside at 0F000:FFF5h. The rest of the copyright signature is obtained by searching for a copyright notice in the BIOS ROM starting at the beginning of segment 0F000h. This works most of the time especially with relatively modern systems. The only quirk I've noticed with recent systems is that some device drivers (e.g. the TCP/IP packet drivers from FTP Systems) very rudely overwrite the relocated BIOS ROM information with their own copyright notice. Sound ----- Sound Boards are detected with all sorts of hairy I/O port bit twiddling which I don't really want to think about any more. The code for doing this was obtained from the aforementioned INFOPLUS Pascal sources (and if you think it looks bad in Pascal, try it in assembler sometime!) Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 56 DOS --- DOS version: Major and minor versions of DOS obtained from DOS function call 30h. System date and time: Read through DOS functions 2Ah and 2Ch. DOS environment space: Used / Total. If used is getting up near total, don't be surprised if you start running into all sorts of peculiar problems on your system which neither you nor anyone else can explain. Total is set through parameters to the CONFIG.SYS SHELL= statement. Files: The number of files set through FILES= in CONFIG.SYS. Buf: The number of Buffers set through BUFFERS= in CONFIG.SYS. Verify: The state of the DOS verify flag. Note that this is the state of this flag in DOS. It does not necessarily reflect its state within DF unless you've configured verify through DFCONFIG as "no change". Break: The state of the DOS break flag. Win: Indicates whether Microsoft Windows is running (i.e. whether you're in a Windows DOS Shell) and, if so, what version. DV: Indicates whether DesqView is running and, if so, what version. The bottom line in the DOS section indicates any detected memory managers. DF looks for QEMM, 386^MAX, and EMM386. In the case of QEMM only, version number information is also returned. Note that environments such as Microsoft Windows may disable memory managers temporarily and make it impossible, therefore, for DF to detect them. Hardware -------- Bus: Detects ISA, EISA, and MCA busses. Does not distinguish 16-bit AT from 8-bit XT. Mouse: Is a mouse present on the system? Note that a physically connected mouse will not be detected if its driver is not present in memory. 101-key Kybd Supported and Present: Detects whether a 101-key keyboard can be supported by the system BIOS and, if so, whether one is present. LPT1 / LPT2 / LPT3: The addresses of each of the parallel printer ports detected on the system. (3 words starting at 040:08h) Directory Freedom 4.60 Page 57 COM1 - COM4: The address and UART type of each of the serial ports detected on the system. The information screen distinguishes among 8250, 16450, and 16550 UART's. (16550 UART's may not be properly detected under Microsoft Windows.) (4 words starting at 040:00h) Disks ----- Logical Drives: All the logical drives detected on the system. Cycles through ALL drive letters checking to see if Set Default Drive (0Eh) function calls work on each. This method captures non-contiguous logical drives. CMOS or BIOS Information: If the system has CMOS RAM (all AT's and later plus some later 8088/86 systems) this item gives the system setup information stored therein. This information may not be complete or accurate for systems such as those with floppy or hard disk drive BIOS's which provide extended capabilities (such a 4 floppy disks). If CMOS is not found, the small degree of information which can be gleaned from the BIOS equipment table is displayed. The cursor keys allow you to move through the system's logical drives. Most of the displayed information is obtained through DOS function 1Ch (Get Allocation Information). Serial number and volume label info is obtained through the undocumented DOS function 69h. Video ----- Video information is obtained from int 10h, function 1Ah if available. Otherwise the video hardware detection routines used by the main DF program are used to identify the main display adapter. Registration for Directory Freedom 4.60 To register, please return this form with your registration check or money order (Purchase orders are also accepted) to: Gordon Haff Bit Masons Consulting 3205 Windsor Ridge Dr. Westborough, MA 01581 Phone: (508) 898-3321 Name ____________________________________ Address ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________ Phone (_____)_____-______ Where did you get DF 4.60 from: BBS / Service Name ______________________ Number (_____)_____-______ DF 4.60 Registration w/ diskette @ $ 25.00 ea $ _______ (Includes a license for one user, diskette w/ DF and associated files, and product support.) DF 4.60 Registration (*) @ $ 20.00 ea $ _______ (Includes a license for one user and product support; NO DISKETTE OR HARDCOPY DOCUMENTATION.) DF 4.60 Registration w/ diskette/docs/upd @ $ 40.00 ea $ _______ (Includes Registration and product support plus: A diskette with DF and associated files, typeset documentation, one free update diskette) DF Companion Utilities Diskette @ $ 5.00 ea $ _______ (Third-party utilities as described in the documentation) DF Update w/ diskette and docs @ $ 15.00 ea $ _______ (Latest revision on diskette plus typeset documentation. REGISTERED USERS ONLY) (**) Non-North American shipping @ $ 5.00 $ _______ TOTAL Enclosed (in US Dollars please) $ _______ If a diskette is being ordered: 3.5" ____ 5.25" ____ (*) Please note that this option covers registration ONLY. You will receive acknowledgement of registration but will NOT receive a diskette or printed documentation! This economy option is intended for those who receive software by electronic means and are sure that they have the latest version. (**) Non-North American orders need include $5.00 extra to cover additional shipping and handling charges ONLY if a diskette and/or manual is being ordered. Please send all payments payable in U.S. Dollars unless you have explicitly made other arrangements with the author. Canadian customers may use Canadian postal money orders in dollar denominations. Feel free to attach any other comments or instructions (e.g. program features you'd like to see, or don't send a copy of the program until the next major rev, etc.) Note that the update option is:: 1) Only available to users who have registered a previous revision of Directory Freedom and 2) Only required of registered users if they wish a copy of the latest revision on disk and a printed manual. In other words, this is a Materials/S&H charge for sending out the latest revision. Registered users of DF who have obtained the latest rev from other sources (e.g. a BBS) are under no obligation to pay an upgrade fee for the use of that rev. (Of course, this revision will be mailed out automatically to those users for whom it represents their free update.) If you or your organization would like a Software Subscription Service so as to receive the latest copies direct from the author as soon as they become available, you may pay for multiple updates at the time of the initial order and, by so doing, will be automatically placed on the list for the appropriate number of future update mailings. If you have special requirements in this area, please call or write. We will try our best to accommodate your needs. The DF Companion Utilities are described in Section 6 of the manual. These are third-party programs which many users have found to complement Directory Freedom well. Bit Masons is acting solely as a distributor for these utilities. Many of the included utilities are Shareware and must be registered with their authors after a trial period if you find them useful. ******************************************************************** Now you can order your very own registered copy of Directory Freedom online! ******************************************************************** Registered copies of the full Directory Freedom package (registration, media, typeset manual, and update) can be ordered online from Channel 1 Communications(R). To order: Call Channel 1 at (617) 354-8873 and logon as a new user (if you are not already a member) Type S at the main Command prompt to get to the Signup menu. Then select the Shareware Registration signup. Order Directory Freedom (specifying 5.25" or 3.5" disks -- if you don't specify, you will be shipped 5.25"), charging it to a major credit card. The price is $40. Massachusetts Residents must add 5% sales tax. Note that your credit card statement will reflect a charge from Channel 1 and not from Bit Masons Consulting or Gordon Haff. Bit Masons Consulting will ship your order promptly. Please do not contact Channel 1 for technical support or other questions about Directory Freedom (such as site licensing or other special orders)