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JP Software
4DOS Application Notes
Version 4.02 -- March 30, 1993
Copyright 1988 - 1993, JP Software Inc., All Rights Reserved. Published
by JP Software Inc., P.O. Box 1470, E. Arlington, MA 02174 USA, (617)
646-3975.
This file provides information on using 4DOS with a variety of other
software products. It is intended for use whenever you have a question
about using another product with 4DOS, or suspect a compatibility
problem.
Inclusion of a product in this file does NOT mean there are
compatibility problems with it! It only indicates that we have some
information that may be useful to you when you use the product with
4DOS.
Items in this file which were changed in 4DOS 4.02 are marked with
"4.02" in the left margin. Other items have not been changed since
version 4.01.
This file is formatted at 58 lines per page, and contains form feeds and
page footers. It is somewhat long, so you may prefer to view it with a
file viewer such as the 4DOS LIST command. You can print this file on
most PC printers using the command:
copy appnotes.doc prn
Printing it with a program that formats the pages is not likely to work
due to the formatting included in the file.
Our customers regularly ask us for recommendations on software to use
with 4DOS. While we can't tell you what is best for your use or your
system, at the end of this file we have included some comments on
software we like and have found useful on our own systems here at JP
Software.
(3/93-4.02A)
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 1
Table of Contents
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
General Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Running 4DOS along with COMMAND.COM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Executing DOS Commands from Your Applications: . . . . . . . . . 7
Swapping to RAM Disks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4DOS and Other Command Line Editing Programs . . . . . . . . . . 8
4DOS and EXE File Compression Programs . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Mouse Compatibility with 4DOS HELP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Information on Specific Products . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
MS-DOS APPEND Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
MS-DOS DATE and TIME Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
MS-DOS FASTOPEN Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
MS-DOS 4.0 and 5.0 FORMAT /S and SYS Command . . . . . . . . . . 12
MS-DOS 6.0 MOVE Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
MS-DOS 4.0 and 5.0 SELECT Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
MS-DOS 6.0 MEMMAKER Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1DIR+ (Bourbaki) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
3COM Networks (3Com) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
AllClear (AllClear Software) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Alpha 4 (Alpha Software) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
ANSI.SYS (various manufacturers) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Bookshelf CD-ROM (Microsoft) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
DESQview (Quarterdeck) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
DOORWAY BBS Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
DR-DOS (Digital Research) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Epsilon (Lugaru Software) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Extra! 3270 Emulator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
FoxPro (Microsoft) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Hijaak (Inset Systems) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
LapLink (Traveling Software) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
LOGIMENU (Logitech) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Manifest (Quarterdeck) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Netware (Novell) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Novell MENU (Novell) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
OS/2 1.2, 1.3, and 2.0 (IBM / Microsoft) . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
OS2SPEED DOS Sessioon Enhancer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Personal REXX (Quercus Systems) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
QEMM and QRAM (Quarterdeck) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
RBase (MicroRim) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
RoboComm Communications Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Software Carousel (SoftLogic Solutions) . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
TSRCOM Utilities (TurboPower Software) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
UltraVision (Personics) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Windows 3.0 and 3.1 (Microsoft) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
XyWrite (XyQuest) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 2
Programs Requiring PATH to be Under 128 Characters . . . . . . . 30
Checkit (Touchstone); Computer Select CD-ROM (Ziff-Davis);
RenderMan (AutoDesk); VINES Network (Banyan); Windows 3.0
(Microsoft)
Software For Use With 4DOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 3
Introduction
------------
We have made every effort to ensure that this file is as accurate and up
to date as possible. Our information is based on our own
investigations, reports from 4DOS beta testers, technical support calls,
discussions with manufacturers of other products, and reports from our
customers. Unfortunately, varying conditions between systems or between
software releases can easily invalidate the results of previous tests.
Therefore we cannot guarantee that every item in this file is accurate
for all systems or will remain accurate over time; you may have to do
your own testing to determine what works well on your system with the
software you own.
If you have a question or problem related to another program, first read
through chapter 7 of the 4DOS manual ("Using 4DOS With Your Hardware And
Software"). Chapter 7 gives general suggestions for using 4DOS with
other products and for solving compatibility problems, and should always
be used along with this file.
If the information in Chapter 7 doesn't help, check below for both
additional general suggestions which pertain to your question, and
information on the specific product you are working with. Please note
that some products are listed by category rather than or in addition to
specific listings by product name; check the Table of Contents carefully
to see where any particular product may be covered.
Many of the items below refer to the 4DOS.INI file. See chapter 6 of
the manual for a complete explanation of 4DOS.INI and the directives
which can be used there. If you have a printed manual, also check
MANMOD.DOC for directives which were added or modified since the manual
went to press.
Virtually all of your software will work with 4DOS with no trouble. If
you do find an interaction or compatibility problem, it can probably be
diagnosed easily with one of three methods: checking this file for
specific information; trying different 4DOS swapping methods; and
testing for interactions by removing all drivers and TSRs which are not
absolutely necessary and then replacing them one at a time. These
methods and other related techniques are described in Chapter 7 of the
manual.
Many popular software products are not covered in this file. If a
program does not appear here, it simply means that as far as we know no
additional information is necessary or useful when using that program
with 4DOS.
If you have a question or problem related to how 4DOS works with other
hardware or software products, and it isn't addressed in chapter 7 or by
these notes, contact JP Software or your dealer for technical support.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 4
General Information
-------------------
Running 4DOS along with COMMAND.COM:
You may find a very rare program which will not work under 4DOS,
but runs properly under COMMAND.COM. If you have determined that
the problem cannot be solved through configuration changes or by
eliminating or reconfiguring a third program which is causing the
problem, use this section to see how to run 4DOS and COMMAND.COM
together in order to diagnose such a problem.
There are two methods of loading COMMAND.COM before another
program. The first is to load it only when a specific program is
running. This can be accomplished with the following command
(assuming COMMAND.COM is in the root directory of drive C:):
c:\command /c progname options
where "progname" is the program name (with path if necessary) and
"options" are any parameters for the program. This command will
run COMMAND.COM, load and run the program, and upon exit from the
program will exit from COMMAND.COM and return to 4DOS. If this
is necessary to run a specific program, it can be defined as an
alias:
alias progname `c:\command /c progname %&`
The "%&" passes all command line arguments on to the program.
With this method, if the program is large COMMAND.COM may need to
reload itself when the program exits. It will not be able to do
so unless the COMSPEC is set properly. If you experience
problems such as "Invalid COMMAND.COM" errors when using this
method, use a batch file like the following to run the program in
question (the SETLOCAL and ENDLOCAL cause COMSPEC to be restored
to its previous value after the program exits). You will need to
modify this file if your copy of COMMAND.COM is not stored in the
C:\ directory:
setlocal
set comspec=C:\COMMAND.COM
c:\command /c progname %&
endlocal
The second method is more drastic: you can start your system
under COMMAND.COM, then run 4DOS. This approach is rarely
necessary, and will use about 4 - 5K of additional RAM for the
resident portion of COMMAND.COM.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 5
The following steps will set your system up to boot with
COMMAND.COM, and run 4DOS automatically as part of the boot
process:
(1) Set up the SHELL= statement in CONFIG.SYS to run
COMMAND.COM, or leave it out entirely. In other words, set
it up just as you would if 4DOS were not on your system.
(2) Separate your AUTOEXEC file into two parts: part 1,
which remains in AUTOEXEC.BAT, should contain any commands
you wish to have COMMAND.COM execute before 4DOS is started.
This might include loading any TSRs which you cannot get to
load properly under 4DOS. Part 2, which you must place in a
separate batch file (we suggest the name 4DAUTO.BAT, but you
can use any name with a .BAT or .BTM extension), should
contain the commands you wish to have 4DOS execute when it is
started.
(3) Place the following line as the last line in the modified
AUTOEXEC.BAT:
4DOS parameters filename
where "parameters" represents the appropriate 4DOS parameters
for swapping, environment and history size, etc. (see the
Installation section of the manual), and "filename" is the
name of the new batch file you created for part 2 of your old
AUTOEXEC file. Do NOT include a /P in the "parameters" or
4DOS will re-run AUTOEXEC and therefore load itself again, ad
infinitum!
(4) Be sure that KSTACK.COM is loaded in your AUTOEXEC.BAT
file or your 4DOS startup file if you wish to use the 4DOS
KEYSTACK command.
This will load COMMAND.COM, execute the commands in AUTOEXEC,
load 4DOS, execute the commands in your new batch file, and then
give you the normal 4DOS prompt.
There is one drawback to this second approach: because 4DOS is
not loaded with a /P, the EXIT command will return you to
COMMAND.COM if you inadvertently enter it at the primary shell
prompt. You can get around this by including the /P parameter
despite the caution above, and then placing the following line at
the start of AUTOEXEC.BAT:
if "%@eval[2+2]"=="4" quit
This line tests the 4DOS variable function %@EVAL, which will
return "4" under 4DOS and remain unchanged under COMMAND.COM. If
%@EVAL returns a "4" the statement QUITs the batch file,
preventing the infinite loop described above.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 6
Executing DOS Commands from Your Applications:
4.02 In general you should have no trouble running DOS commands or
"shelling to DOS" from within your applications. If you do,
first follow the instructions in Chapter 7 of the manual, check
your COMSPEC setting, and check that enough memory is available
for 4DOS to execute as a secondary shell.
If those techniques do not resolve the problem, it may be due to
one of the issues covered below: either the application was
developed with a compiler that does not handle the format of
4DOS.COM properly, or it is using interrupt 2E and you have
disabled interrupt 2E support.
Compilers and the Format of 4DOS.COM:
If you have an application which can run DOS commands from
inside the application and that particular feature does not
work, try to determine if the application was developed with
Borland C or Lattice C. Some versions of these compilers
cannot properly execute 4DOS.COM to start a secondary shell,
because 4DOS.COM (despite its name) is really an EXE file,
and the libraries shipped with these compilers do not use the
proper method to determine what type of file they are
running.
If you suspect sucha problem, make a copy of 4DOS.COM named
4DOS.EXE, and SET your COMSPEC variable to this file, for
example:
d:\4dos> copy 4dos.com 4dos.exe
d:\4dos> set comspec=d:\4dos\4dos.exe
Then run the application in question and see if it works. If
so, you can use the above workaround to run the application.
Be sure to contact the application vendor to see if they have
an update which corrects this problem.
For users of Borland C and C++, a fix is available for this
problem (the fix updates certain functions in the Borland C
run-time library). You can download this fix from the
Borland support area on CompuServe, and it is distributed
with newer copies of the Borland compilers.
Re-Enabling Interrupt 2E Support:
COMMAND.COM contains an undocumented feature which allows
programs to execute DOS commands by passing the command
through software interrupt number 2E (hex). Very few
programs use this feature, but full, documented support for
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 7
it is available within 4DOS for those circumstances where
it's needed.
Interrupt 2E support is normally enabled within 4DOS, but can
be disabled to save memory (INT 2E support requires about 100
bytes of resident memory).
If you have a program which is supposed to execute DOS
commands and it does not work under 4DOS, check your 4DOS.INI
file. If you see a line like this:
FullINT2E = No
then you have disabled INT 2E support. If the line is there,
try removing this line or replacing it with one reading:
FullINT2E = Yes
to re-enable support for interrupt 2E, then chcek whether
your program works properly.
See Appendix C of the ASCII manual, or the MANMOD.DOC file if
you have a printed manual, for technical details on the INT
2E interface.
Swapping to RAM Disks:
In order to swap the primary shell to a RAM disk the RAM disk
must be completely defined in CONFIG.SYS via a DEVICE= statement
(most RAM disks are set up this way). RAM disks completely or
partially defined in AUTOEXEC.BAT (such as the RAM disk / cache
combination in Multisoft's PC Kwik Power Pak) cannot be used for
swapping the primary shell, because AUTOEXEC.BAT has not been
executed at the time that the root shell is loaded, and hence the
RAM disk does not exist at that point.
4DOS and Other Command Line Editing Programs:
Programs such as Anarkey (Moderne Software), PCED (Cove
Software), and ReDOS (Multisoft) will work properly with 4DOS.
However these programs require the use of SETDOS /L1 to operate,
which will disable 4DOS's command recall and command line
editing. In most cases you will be able to switch back and forth
between 4DOS editing and the other editor by toggling the SETDOS
/L state.
When another editor is used 4DOS's command history will be
maintained, and can be viewed with HISTORY, but will not be
available for recall until a SETDOS /L0 is executed. 4DOS
aliases, executable extensions, and other features will be active
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 8
regardless of the SETDOS /L state. Aliases will be processed
after any processing done by the other editing program. You must
use care with other programs that provide an aliasing capability
to avoid confusion if a command is expanded by both the other
program and 4DOS!
4DOS and EXE File Compression Programs:
If you use a file compression program like PKLITE, LZEXE, or
DIET, you must use caution when compressing 4DOS files. Most
such programs should be able to compress the 4DOS.COM file with
no trouble. However if you have a copy of 4DOS that you intend
to brand with your name and serial number, you must brand it
BEFORE you run the file compression program, or the BRAND program
will fail. Similarly, HELPCFG will not be able to modify your
HELP system colors if you compress the 4HELP.EXE program. The
only compressed program files distributed with 4DOS are
HELPCFG.EXE, and 4MAKE.EXE on the 4DOS / 4OS2 Utility Disk; these
files are compressed with the PKLite Professional package.
Mouse Compatibility with 4DOS HELP:
The 4DOS HELP system depends on correct operation of your mouse
driver. If your mouse doesn't work in HELP, or you have trouble
with mouse "droppings" (characters left behind by the mouse
cursor), be sure you have the most up to date working version of
your mouse driver that is available.
Users of Microsoft serial and PS/2 mice may notice a long delay
when the HELP system starts. This is due to the long
initialization time required for these mice, and is a function of
the mouse driver, not the HELP system. If you don't use the
mouse in HELP and want to speed up HELP startup, set
HelpOptions = /X in 4DOS.INI. This will disable all mouse access
in the HELP system.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 9
Information on Specific Products
--------------------------------
The information below is listed alphabetically by product, with
manufacturers' names included. MS-DOS commands are listed before other
software products.
Items marked with two asterisks [**] after the product name were
supplied by users, and have not been tested by JP Software.
MS-DOS APPEND Command:
Unlike most other commands in MS-DOS, APPEND has both an external
portion and an undocumented internal portion. The first time
APPEND is run the external portion is executed, and loaded into
memory as a TSR (memory-resident program). Subsequent uses of
APPEND to adjust the APPEND path use an undocumented internal
interface between COMMAND.COM and the TSR portion of APPEND.
4DOS does not support the internal portion of APPEND command.
This means that you cannot change the APPEND path directly from
4DOS. However you can still use APPEND with 4DOS.
APPEND should initially be loaded in the usual way, from AUTOEXEC
or any other batch file, or from the command line. However to
change the APPEND path after APPEND has been loaded for the first
time, you must run APPEND from COMMAND.COM, not from 4DOS. To do
this, enter the following command (modify the command
appropriately if COMMAND.COM is not in the directory C:\):
c:\command /c append [new append path list]
You could also set up a 4DOS alias to do the above command for
you, for example:
alias app `c:\command /c append`
which would be invoked with the command
app [new path list]
The /X switch can be used, and it will affect 4DOS directory
searches for many 4DOS commands (as it does for COMMAND.COM).
Please note that this makes APPEND very dangerous: if you APPEND
a directory with /X and then (say) delete *.BAK when no such
files exist in the current directory, then the .BAK files in the
APPENDed directory will be deleted instead.
The APPEND /E switch will not work with 4DOS.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 10
! CAUTION: In our opinion APPEND is an extremely dangerous
command. It is capable of "fooling" programs into thinking they
are accessing one file when they are really accessing another one
with the same name in a different directory. This can either do
just what you want, or cause all sorts of trouble, depending on
the circumstances. In particular, this behavior can cause 4DOS
to place descriptions which go with files in one directory in the
description file for another directory, because with APPEND
running 4DOS can't tell whether APPEND has opened a file
different from the one it asked for.
If you must use APPEND to make certain applications work, we
STRONGLY suggest that you set up the aliases described above, and
load APPEND in AUTOEXEC.BAT with an empty path. Then, for each
application, set up an alias to run it that is similar to the
following:
alias myprog `app c:\mydata^d:\util\myprog.exe^app ;`
This alias sets the APPEND path, runs the application, and clears
the APPEND path. When used in this way APPEND is less likely to
cause trouble because it is disabled except when it is explicitly
needed.
4.02 In MS-DOS 4.0 and above, and in OS/2 2.x, the APPEND /PATH:OFF
switch mitigates this problem somewhat; in particular it will
keep 4DOS file description files from getting mixed up between
directories. For this reason 4DOS will automatically set this
switch if it detects that you are running APPEND and DOS 4.0 or
above.
MS-DOS DATE and TIME Commands:
Most PC systems automatically set the hardware clock date and
time (which is maintained while the system is turned off, and is
different from the DOS date and time) when the corresponding DOS
command is executed. In most such cases the hardware
manufacturer has implemented this capability within the BIOS
built into the system. This type of implementation is compatible
with 4DOS, and the 4DOS DATE and TIME commands will set the
hardware clock properly.
A very small number of manufacturers have modified the version
COMMAND.COM which they sell with their PCs to perform this
function. In these cases, 4DOS's DATE and TIME commands, which
do not have such hardware-specific modifications, will not set
the hardware clock. If you normally set the hardware clock's
date and time with DOS commands, and they don't work under 4DOS,
first check your clock's battery! If it's OK, either run a
secondary copy of COMMAND.COM to set the date and time, or invoke
your system's SETUP or other utility program to do so.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 11
MS-DOS FASTOPEN Command:
The MS-DOS FASTOPEN command generally works with 4DOS, but does
not properly detect renamed directories, and may have similar
problems when directories are removed. This is a problem in
FASTOPEN, not in 4DOS. If you use FASTOPEN and rename a
directory with the 4DOS REN command, then do a DIR command, you
may see the old name and not the new one displayed; you may also
occasionally have trouble accessing files under the new name.
You can usually solve this problem by including a DiskReset = Yes
directive in 4DOS.INI. If DiskReset = Yes does not work, the
only other solution we are aware of is to reboot your system
after renaming a directory.
Our opinion is that, if you have the memory to support it, a disk
caching program will provide a much greater and more effective
performance improvement than FASTOPEN.
MS-DOS 4.0 and 5.0 FORMAT /S and SYS Commands:
4.02 The FORMAT /S and SYS commands in DOS 4 and DOS 5 will copy
4DOS.COM to a newly formatted floppy disk and rename it
COMMAND.COM, which may not be what you want and is confusing at
best. See the discussion of "4DOS and DOS" in Chapter 7 of the
manual for more information on this issue. This problem has been
addressed in MS-DOS 6.0, where the FORMAT /S and SYS commands
will properly copy COMMAND.COM to the floppy disk even when 4DOS
is the command processor.
MS-DOS 6.0 MOVE Command:
4.02 MS-DOS 6 includes an external MOVE command which is generally
compatible with the 4DOS MOVE command.
The syntax and features of the MS-DOS 6 MOVE command are slightly
different than those offered by 4DOS's MOVE, so batch files
written for one command may not work exactly the same way with
the other, especially if more advanced or complex features are
used. If you write batch files which use both commands, check
the 4DOS and MS-DOS 6 documentation for your particular usage.
One difference is that, unlike 4DOS, the MS-DOS 6 MOVE command
will rename directories if the source refers to a directory, the
destination name is in the same path, and the destination
directory does not exist. For example, if you enter this
command:
c:\data> move olddir newdir
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 12
when OLDDIR exists and NEWDIR does not, then MS-DOS 6 MOVE will
rename OLDDIR to NEWDIR, whereas 4DOS will treat NEWDIR as a
destination file name (not a directory name). If you use
MOVE /D, 4DOS will treat NEWDIR as a directory name, and prompt
you for whether to create the directory, but 4DOS will not rename
OLDDIR automatically as MS-DOS 6 MOVE will. For more details on
how 4DOS MOVE handles destination names, see MOVE in the 4DOS
manual or online help.
MS-DOS 4.0 and 5.0 SELECT Command:
In MS-DOS 4.0 and 5.0, a SELECT command was included. This
external command is totally unrelated to the 4DOS internal SELECT
command. If you need to use both, you can set up aliases to
adjust how the command names are handled. For example, the
following two aliases set up SELECT to access the DOS 4.0
external SELECT command (assumed to be stored in
C:\DOS\SELECT.EXE), and SEL to access the internal 4DOS SELECT
command:
alias select c:\dos\select.exe
alias sel *select
MS-DOS 6.0 MEMMAKER Command:
4.02 4DOS 4.02 is fully compatible with MemMaker. MemMaker adds
commands to the end of your AUTOEXEC.BAT file during its
operation, and removes them when it is finished. If for some
reason you have used a QUIT command in AUTOEXEC.BAT, remove it
before running MemMaker. Otherwise, MemMaker's commands will not
run and the memory optimization process will not work properly.
1DIR+ (Bourbaki):
The information below was obtained from tests with 1DIR+ version
3.02, and verified with version 3.5 as well.
1DIR+ will work properly under 4DOS in its partially resident or
EMS modes when set up as described below. It will work in its
fully resident mode but cannot reliably exit back to 4DOS once
started.
If your copy of 1DIR+ is set up for fully resident mode, you can
load it into memory under 4DOS to switch it to partially resident
or EMS mode. To do so, from the directory where you normally run
1DIR+, type the commands:
setdos /l1
1dirplus
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 13
When 1DIR+ starts go to the "Wonder" / "Setup" menu and switch
the mode to partially resident or EMS. Hit Esc to exit, and take
the "Exit/Save" option (not "Save/Reset"). Back at the main
menu, exit with "Wonder" / "Exit". At this point the system will
probably hang. Reboot your computer. You should then be able to
run 1DIR+ as described below.
The above steps only need to be done once, when you install or
re-install 1DIR+.
Once 1DIR+ is set to EMS or partially-resident mode, you can
start it from 4DOS using the following alias:
alias 1dir `setdos /L1 ^ 1dirplus`
The SETDOS /L1 is necessary to allow 1DIR+ to send command lines
to 4DOS.
You must do a SETDOS /L0 when you are done with 1DIR+ in order to
get normal 4DOS command-line editing back. You can NOT do this
within the alias above, as 1DIR+ returns to 4DOS in order to
accomplish its work, and you don't want to switch back to /L0
mode until 1DIRPLUS has been removed from memory. If, after
exiting from 1DIR+, you find that 4DOS's command line editing and
history are unavailable, it is because you forgot to do the
SETDOS /L0. If you go in and out of 1DIR+ regularly aliases like
the following can be used to make the process quick:
alias 1d `setdos /L1 ^ 1dirplus`
alias 1e setdos /L0
If you run batch files from the 1DIRPLUS "compose" feature, you
may find that INPUT commands in the batch file don't work
properly unless they are preceded by SETDOS /L0. You must also
do a SETDOS /L1 before the end of the batch file, or 1DIRPLUS
won't pop up properly when the batch file is finished. For
example:
setdos /l0
input Enter your name: %%name
setdos /l1
3COM Networks (3Com): [**]
Some users report that 3Com network software will not load
properly if UMBLoad = Yes is used in 4DOS.INI. If you have
trouble with a 3Com network and 4DOS, try removing the UMBLoad
and UMBEnvironment directives from your 4DOS.INI file.
AllClear (AllClear Software): [**]
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 14
4.02 AllClear may not work properly under 4DOS unless if it is invoked
with a simple program name, such as A.COM. However it works
properly if invoked with its full path name, for example
D:\ALLCLEAR\A.COM. If you use AllClear, you can set up an alias
to do this, for example:
alias ac d:\allclear\a.com
Alpha 4 (Alpha Software): [**]
Alpha 4 does not work properly if you have too much environment
space in use when it is started. You can use the 4DOS SETLOCAL,
ENDLOCAL, and UNSET commands to decrease the amount of
environment space in use before starting Alpha 4. For details on
this technique see the section on "Solving Software Compatibility
Problems" in chapter 7 of the 4DOS manual.
ANSI.SYS (various manufacturers):
If you have trouble with screen scrolling in 43-line or 50-line
mode, try a different version of ANSI. We have had good results
with PC Magazine's free utility ANSI.COM, and with the ANSI-
UV.SYS program distributed with Personics' UltraVision EGA / VGA
enhancement software.
Some display-related device drivers may "fool" 4DOS into thinking
an ANSI driver is present when this is not the case. If this
happens you will see ANSI strings like "[2J" displayed on-screen
when you use the CLS and COLOR commands. To correct the problem,
place an ANSI = No directive in 4DOS.INI, or a SETDOS /A2 command
in AUTOEXEC.BAT.
Bookshelf CD-ROM (Microsoft): [**]
Microsoft Bookshelf uses the environment variable CDPATH, which
is also used (for a totally different purpose) by 4DOS. If you
are using MS Bookshelf and want to set a CDPATH variable for
4DOS, set _CDPATH instead. 4DOS will search for _CDPATH first;
when it is found, 4DOS will use it, and ignore CDPATH.
DESQview (Quarterdeck):
Most information about DESQview is in chapter 7 of the manual.
4DOS 4.0 automatically "cleans up" its resources (releases the
shell number and deletes any disk swap file) when you Close a
DESQview window from the DESQview menu without EXITing from 4DOS.
However this feature has a side effect: it disables the Quit
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 15
option on the DESQview menu (this is due to the design of
DESQview, not to anything within 4DOS). 4DOS gives you control
over this behavior with the DVCleanup directive in 4DOS.INI. If
DVCleanup is set to Yes (the default), 4DOS will work as it did
in version 4.0. Setting DVCleanup to No will disable 4DOS's
DESQview close window cleanup code and thereby reenable the Quit
choice on the menu. However this will prevent 4DOS from cleaning
up its resources when you Close a 4DOS window from the menu,
rather than with the EXIT command.
4.02 Some users report that DESQview uses all upper memory space when
it loads, leaving no upper memory available to 4DOS. If you have
UMBLoad and / or UMBEnvironment set to Yes in 4DOS.INI, this will
result in a couple of harmless error messages when 4DOS is
started under DESQview. To eliminate these messages, place the
following lines at the end of 4DOS.INI:
[Secondary]
UMBLoad = No
UMBEnnvironment = No
DESQview includes the ability to assign "logical drives" to
subdirectory paths to make access to commonly used directories
easier, or to support older applications that can't handle
subdirectories. This is similar to the DOS SUBST command. 4DOS
commands like DIR and COPY may not work as you expect on DESQview
logical drives, because DESQview does not support certain
standard DOS calls which 4DOS uses to determine whether a name
you enter is the name of a file or a subdirectory. If you are
using specific filenames without wildcards, 4DOS commands will
generally work properly on DESQview logical drives. However
problems may occur with "implied wildcards" (for example, when
4DOS interprets DIR A* as DIR A*.*), filename completion, and
other wildcard file access. We know of no circumstances where
these problems would cause a loss of data. However for the sake
of safety, when using DESQview logical drives we suggest you use
the /N switches on commands like COPY and MOVE to verify the
command's operation before files are actually modified.
Under 4DOS, the DESQview DOS Services option will not work in its
default configuration. To make DOS Services work under 4DOS, you
must first create a batch file, DOSSERV.BAT, in your DESQview
directory to run DOS Services under COMMAND.COM. (We are
assuming that DESQview is in directory C:\DV and COMMAND.COM is
in directory C:\; you will need to modify the settings below if
your system is configured differently.) The batch file is:
set comspec=c:\command.com
c:\dv\dosserv
c:\command
exit
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 16
Then, make the following changes on the DESQview change a program
screen for DOS Services (items marked ** are on the second page
of the screen):
* Memory Allocation = 128K or greater
* Program Name = C:\DV\DOSSERV.BAT (modify from
previous value of C:\DV\DOSSERV).
** Close on Exit to DOS = N
** System Memory = 10K or greater
** Allow Close Window = N
Once these steps are taken, you should be able to open the DOS
Services window normally. However you will not be able to close
it with a close window command. Instead, go to the window where
DOS Services allows you to compose a DOS command, and type EXIT
to close the window.
DOORWAY BBS Software:
DOORWAY uses the caret [^] in certain command line arguments.
4DOS will interpret this symbol as a command separator, and will
not pass the line to DOORWAY properly. You can work around this
problem by changing your 4DOS command separator permanently (with
the CommandSep directive in 4DOS.INI) or temporarily when
starting DOORWAY (with the SETDOS /C command), or by using the
4DOS escape character (ctrl-X) before each caret in the DOORWAY
command line.
DR-DOS (Digital Research):
4DOS will work properly as a command processor (including as the
primary shell) under DR-DOS 3.4, 5.0, or 6.0. The information
below was developed by testing 4DOS under DR-DOS 5.0 and 6.0.
Internal vs. External Commands:
DR-DOS 5.0's design makes the ASSIGN, JOIN, MORE, and SUBST
commands internal (in MS-DOS / PC-DOS they are external).
4DOS supports all MS-DOS internal commands, but does not have
internal support for ASSIGN, JOIN, MORE, and SUBST. To
access these DR-DOS internal commands when using 4DOS as the
command processor, you must set up aliases which run DR-DOS's
COMMAND.COM. The following 4DOS aliases accomplish this
(adjust these if COMMAND.COM is not in C:\):
alias assign `c:\command /c assign %&`
alias join `c:\command /c join %&`
alias more `c:\command /c more %&`
alias subst `c:\command /c subst %&`
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 17
In DR-DOS 6.0 ASSIGN, JOIN, and SUBST were changed back to
external commands, so the corresponding aliases are not
necessary.
For the MORE command, a much better alternative can be set up
by aliasing it to the 4DOS LIST command:
alias more list /s
This provides a scrollable, full-screen display rather than
the simple paged display offered by DR-DOS (or MS-DOS) MORE.
HILOAD:
4DOS supports DR-DOS's HILOAD feature using the MS-DOS / PC-
DOS command names of LOADHIGH or LH. To load a TSR high
under DR-DOS, simply use the command:
LH [programname] [options]
If you want the command to be called HILOAD for complete DR-
DOS compatibility, just set up an alias before using it:
alias hiload lh
Just as under MS-DOS, LOADHIGH and LH will not work properly
unless you have memory management software loaded to provide
upper memory block support. Because DR-DOS does not return
any error to 4DOS if a LOADHIGH operation fails, 4DOS cannot
report this condition to you. This means you must use the
DR-DOS MEM program or another similar memory mapping utility
to determine if your TSR was actually loaded high.
4.02 The MS-DOS 6.0 switches for the 4DOS LH command (/L and /S)
will not work with DR-DOS.
File Passwords:
4DOS includes support for DR-DOS file passwords. However the
command syntax used to access files with passwords is
slightly different than under DR-DOS.
First, the character used to separate passwords from
filenames under DR-DOS is a semicolon [;], which 4DOS uses to
separate parts of an "include list" (see the manual for
details). Therefore, a slightly different syntax must be
used when including a DR-DOS password in a 4DOS internal
command which accepts wildcards: TWO semicolons should be
used to separate the password and filename. 4DOS directory-
related commands like MD and CD do not use wildcards and
therefore a single semicolon should be used before a password
in these commands. All other 4DOS commands which accept
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 18
wildcards must use the double semicolon. DR-DOS external
commands which accept the "password;filename" syntax will
still use only a single semicolon.
Second, DR-DOS hides files which are password-protected.
This means that you must use 4DOS command switches which
allow processing of hidden files (COPY /H, DEL /Z, DIR /A,
MOVE /H, and SELECT /A) to access a password-protected file
under DR-DOS.
Passwords are not automatically preserved when copying or
moving a file with 4DOS. However the hidden attribute will
be preserved. This means that if you move or copy a
passworded file and want it to be visible in its new location
or under its new name, you will have to manually remove the
hidden attribute with ATTRIB.
For example, to password-protect the file JUNK, copy it to
drive A:, and then delete it:
password junk /r:fred
copy /h junk;;fred a:
del /z junk;;fred
To unprotect the password-protected file JUNK:
password junk;fred /n
CONFIG.SYS SETs:
DR-DOS allows you to put SET commands in CONFIG.SYS to set
environment variables. 4DOS will retrieve this information
and store it in the 4DOS environment, as DR-DOS COMMAND.COM
does. If you wish you can disable this feature by setting
DRSets = No in 4DOS.INI.
SuperStor:
4.02 The version of SuperStor shipped with DR-DOS works well with
4DOS. However some users report that 4DOS.COM cannot be
stored on a compressed drive, and that if it is, DR-DOS will
not be able to find 4DOS during the boot process. If you
experience this problem, store 4DOS on your uncompressed boot
drive instead.
TASKMAX:
4DOS will work with TASKMAX as long as you start new tasks
according to the instructions below.
You cannot load 4DOS's resident portion high with UMBLoad =
Yes in your 4DOS.INI file when running TASKMAX. TASKMAX will
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 19
hang the system if it is started while 4DOS is loaded high.
In our tests we have found that the same restriction does not
apply to the UMBEnvironment directive, which does appear to
be compatible with TASKMAX. Some users also report that
UMBLoad = Yes will work for secondary shells but not for the
primary shell; the exact behavior appears to depend on your
system and DR-DOS configuration.
When TASKMAX is loaded it leaves the primary command
processor running as task 1. One way to start another task
is to pop up TASKMAX and press Ins. This starts another
"instance" of the primary command processor, and may cause
significant problems with 4DOS. The reason is that each task
started in this way is a copy of the primary command
processor, so all such tasks will use the same swap area.
This will make changes to things like aliases, history, and
SETDOS settings in one task "bleed through" to other tasks.
The exact nature of the bleed-through will depend on the
sequence of operations and the type of 4DOS swapping you use.
This bleed-through will not necessarily hang your system but
it may lead to very strange and undesired results, especially
when running batch files simultaneously in more than one
task. There is no way for 4DOS to detect or prevent this
condition. We strongly recommend that you do NOT use Ins to
start new 4DOS tasks, even if it temporarily appears to work
properly on your system.
Fortunately TASKMAX offers another way to start new tasks:
the TASKMAX /C command. When executed from task 1, a command
like:
taskmax /c c:\4dos.com
will start a new secondary copy of 4DOS as a new task. This
new copy is a true secondary shell (not a copy of the primary
shell) and will not cause the undesirable interactions
described above. The same approach should be used when
starting any task which needs a command processor. To start
a task which runs a .BTM or .BAT file, use a command like
this:
taskmax /c c:\4dos.com /c startwp.bat
This tells 4DOS to run the specified batch file, and exit
automatically (removing the task from the task list) when the
batch file is done.
If you have tasks you start regularly using the approach
described above, use a batch file or a set of 4DOS aliases to
help automate the process.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 20
Some users also report success at improving compatibility
between TASKMAX and 4DOS if the FullINT2E directive is set to
Yes in 4DOS.INI. JP Software has not tested this approach
but you may wish to experiment with it on your system.
Epsilon (Lugaru Software): [**]
Epsilon can run 4DOS as a concurrent process, and pass commands
to 4DOS for execution. In this mode it traps 4DOS's input
requests and feeds the keystrokes to 4DOS. However it does not
feed backspaces etc. -- only actual characters. This means that
editing of input isn't seen by 4DOS. To fix the problem, either
run 4DOS as a shell, and not as a concurrent process, or use a
SETDOS /L1 for the copy of 4DOS that is run under Epsilon.
To use the more flexible SETDOS /L1 approach you must use
4START.BAT (or .BTM) to set up the SETDOS /L1 before running
Epsilon. Epsilon sets the environment variable EPSRUNS=Y
whenever it starts a secondary shell; you can use this variable
to set up 4START to work with Epsilon. Place the following line
in 4START to issue the SETDOS /L1 command in a secondary shell
started by Epsilon, but ignore it otherwise:
if "%epsruns"=="Y" setdos /l1
Extra! 3270 Emulator: [**]
4.02 User reports indicate that Extra! will not work properly if 4DOS
or the master environment is loaded high (in a UMB). If you have
trouble running Extra! with 4DOS, try removing any
UMBEnvironment = Yes line in 4DOS.INI; if that doesn't help, try
removing any UMBLoad = Yes line as well.
FoxPro (Microsoft): [**]
FoxPro works well with 4DOS, but may have trouble if 4DOS or the
master environment is loaded high (in a UMB). If you experience
compatibility problems between FoxPro and 4DOS, try removing any
UMBEnvironment = Yes line in 4DOS.INI; if that doesn't help, try
removing any UMBLoad = Yes line as well.
Hijaak (Inset Systems):
The Resident Program Manager (RPM) cannot be loaded from Hijaak's
menu when 4DOS is the command processor. If you try to load RPM
from the menu you will receive "Out of memory" errors once it is
loaded. This is due to the internal design of Hijaak and is not
a 4DOS bug. To work around this problem, use the LOADRPM command
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 21
from the 4DOS prompt, as described in the Hijaak manual. LOADRPM
will load RPM with no trouble under 4DOS, the problem occurs when
loading from the Hijaak menu only.
LapLink (Traveling Software): [**]
4.02 LapLink's "self-cloning" feature is not compatible with 4DOS's
CTTY command. If you need to use the self-cloning feature, start
a temporary copy of COMMAND.COM first (see "Running 4DOS along
with COMMAND>COM" at the beginning of this file for details).
LOGIMENU (Logitech): [**]
When using Logitech's LOGIMENU with 4DOS, LOGIMENU may leave a
file open each time a menu is unloaded. Some users have been
able to work around this problem by loading the menu from a
floppy disk or RAM disk rather than the hard disk, but in general
you will probably need to load and unload LOGIMENU with a product
like MARK and RELEASE (from TurboPower's freeware TSRCOM package,
available on the 4DOS Utility Disk), which can help to clean up
files left open by other programs.
Manifest (Quarterdeck):
Manifest generally works well with 4DOS. However if there is too
little environment space free in 4DOS's master environment, the
Hints Detail screen in Manifest may give unexpected results or
hang your system. If this occurs, increase your environment size
and / or remove some environment variables when starting Manifest
if you plan to use the Hints Detail screen.
Netware (Novell): [**]
The information below was obtained from tests with Netware
versions 2.12, 2.15, and 3.11 - 3.2, and Netware 386, and from
discussions with Novell support personnel.
Compatibility problems between Netware and 4DOS should be quite
rare. When they do occur, the usual problem is a conflict
between 4DOS and the Netware shell (NET3, NET4, NET5, NETX,
EMSNETX, etc.). As a general rule, you should find that Novell's
newer "NETX" shell versions have considerably fewer problems than
the older NET3 / NET4 / NET5 versions, and we recommend their use
with 4DOS whenever possible.
4DOS includes a 4DOS.INI directive for Netware, NetwareNames.
You should always set NetwareNames = Yes on Netware systems.
This will include strings in the resident portion of 4DOS which
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 22
Netware searches for when it loads, and thereby avoid problems
with destroyed environment variables during LOGIN. Setting
NetwareNames = Yes will increase the resident size of 4DOS by 112
bytes.
If you use NetwareNames = Yes and UMBLoad = Yes, and you do not
actually have any upper memory blocks available, then
NetwareNames will be ignored, and you may see problems with your
environment after using LOGIN. To correct this, do not use
UMBLoad with NetwareNames unless you have enough space in upper
memory for the resident portion of 4DOS. See your 4DOS manual
for more information on UMBLoad.
[CAUTION: If NetwareNames is set to Yes and you BOOT FROM a
Netware drive (a rare situation), the TEMP4DOS or TEMP variables
must be SET explicitly to the appropriate drive and directory for
each user to avoid conflicts in the directory used for pipe
files. If NetwareNames is not used or you boot from a local
drive, 4DOS and Netware will automatically set the proper drive
and directory for pipe files.]
4.02 Under Netware version 3 and above, 4DOS commands which scan a
directory tree (e.g. COPY /S, DIR /S, GLOBAL, etc.) may stop
without scanning the entire tree, and without displaying an error
message. This is because such commands can exceed the size of
the directory search table on your server; it is a Netware design
issue, and not a 4DOS bug. You can address any such problem by
having your system administrator increase the Maximum Oustanding
NCP Searches parameter for the server in question. This
parameter is documented in the Netware System Administrator's
manual, Console Set Parameters section, under Miscellaneous
Advanced parameters. The default value is 51, the minimum is 10,
and the maximum is 1000. The parameter can be set "on the fly"
without restarting the server.
4.02 4DOS can be set up to run properly on Novell Netware diskless
workstations which boot from the server. To do so, you must make
several changes to 4DOS.INI and your other startup files. JP
Software has a separate technical document on the steps required.
If you need a copy, contact us and we will mail it to you. You
can also download a copy from our CompuServe support area; the
file name is DISKLS.ZIP.
Some versions of Netware may occasionally produce a "pipe not
found" message when loading under 4DOS. This message refers to
Netware features related to COMMAND.COM, and does not apply to
4DOS; the message can be ignored.
The 4DOS TRUENAME command and the @TRUENAME variable function
will return true Netware server names when given a file name that
refers to a Netware drive. However the returned name will not be
correct if only the root directory name is given as a parameter
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 23
(for example TRUENAME K:\). This is because Netware fails to
recognize the true name request properly when only a root
directory name is given; it is not a bug in 4DOS. If necessary,
you can work around this problem by adding a simple "." to the
request (TRUENAME K:\.).
If you use 4DOS input redirection in a .BAT file which resides on
a Netware drive, you may experience incorrect file assignments on
some systems. When this occurs, an application run from within
the batch file, or a secondary shell run from such an
application, may loop forever attempting to read lines from the
batch file rather than accepting input from the keyboard. For
example:
copy /r *.* g: < YES
wp
rem Now if the user shells from WP, the system will
rem loop forever reading lines from the batch file or
rem blank lines at the prompt.
This problem occurs because Netware does not handle file
assignments properly when 4DOS input redirection is used in a
.BAT file. We are working with Novell to attempt to resolve the
problem. You can work around it in several ways:
* Change the batch file to a .BTM file.
* Place the file BTM mode with the LOADBTM command at any
point prior to the use of input redirection.
* Move the file to a non-Netware drive.
* User reports indicate that adding a line which does a
"dummy" output redirection just before the input redirection
will prevent the problem from occurring. For example:
echo This is junk > junk.dat
copy /r *.* g: < YES
wp
del junk.dat
When loading a secondary 4DOS shell under Netware you can swap
the shell to a network drive if you configure 4DOS properly. To
do so you must take into account the fact that Netware closes all
files -- including the 4DOS swap file -- each time an application
exits. Under the default 4DOS configuration, the next time 4DOS
uses the swap file, a swap file seek error will occur. However
if you set SwapReopen = Yes in 4DOS.INI, 4DOS will reopen its
swap file each time such an error occurs, and the swapping will
work. See the manual for details on SwapReopen. You can also
avoid this problem by swapping to EMS, XMS, or a local hard disk
or RAM disk.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 24
Use caution with the 4DOS UNSET command under Netware. When
Netware is loaded it remembers the exact location of the COMSPEC
variable in the master environment, and it may therefore have
problems if variables such as COMSPEC and PATH are removed and
reloaded in a different sequence.
The UMBLoad directive in 4DOS.INI is compatible with Netware.
The UMBEnvironment directive is compatible with Netware 3.11 and
above, but not with earlier versions.
Novell MENU (Novell):
The Novell MENU system distributed with Netware uses Interrupt 2E
to execute menu options, and therefore requires the use of the
FullINT2E = Yes directive in 4DOS.INI. Once INT 2E support is
enabled with this directive, Novell MENU should work normally
under 4DOS.
OS/2 1.2, 1.3, and 2.0 (IBM / Microsoft):
4DOS works properly as the shell in OS/2 DOS sessions under OS/2
1.2, 1.3, and 2.0. When installing OS/2's dual boot option you
may receive a warning because your SHELL command in CONFIG.SYS
points to 4DOS rather than COMMAND.COM. In our experience this
warning can be ignored, and OS/2 will install properly.
4.02 If you see a message like "Cannot find OSO001.MSG" when running
external utilities like TREE or DISKCOPY in OS/2 DOS sessions,
you probably need to include the line:
loadhigh append c:\os2;c:\os2\system
in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file used by these DOS sessions, or set up
the append path in an alias or batch file used to run such
programs (change the drive letter if OS/2 is installed on a
different drive). Be sure to read the notes and cautions on
MS-DOS APPEND in this file before using APPEND.
If you use OS/2, you will probably want to use our companion
product 4OS2 in your OS/2 sessions. See the ORDERINF.DOC file
for more information. The 4OS2 manual also includes detailed
information on fine-tuning 4DOS for use in your OS/2 DOS
sessions.
OS2SPEED DOS Sessioon Enhancer:
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 25
OS2SPEED is a small freeware program which is supposed to release
unused CPU time in OS/2 DOS sessions when certain applications
are running, and thereby improve performance. It accomplishes
this task by fooling DOS applications into thinking they are
running under DESQview, then converting the applications'
commands to release unused time to DESQview into similar commands
for OS/2.
Unfortunately, the version of OS2SPEED available as of this
writing is flawed because it provides only a partial emulation of
DESQview, and can cause "DESQview-aware" applications -- like
4DOS -- to crash the DOS session. We recommend that you use
OS/2's IDLE_SECONDS and IDLE_SENSITIVITY DOS settings to adjust
DOS session performance. If you must use OS2SPEED, you may be
able to make it work properly with 4DOS by disabling 4DOS's
DESQview awareness with this directive in 4DOS.INI:
DVCleanup = No
Personal REXX (Quercus Systems): [**]
Personal REXX generally works well with 4DOS. However there are
some issues you must take into account when using certain
personal REXX features.
The Personal REXX Batch Manager will not work with 4DOS as the
command processor. The Batch Manager allows REXX programs to be
executed from the command line without requiring a REXX or RX
command prefix. The Batch Manager accomplishes this by using an
undocumented feature of COMMAND.COM, and Mansfield Software
states that this may not work on OEM versions of DOS, and advises
that if it does not work, you should not use it. To work around
this problem, use executable extensions to tell 4DOS to execute
.REX files using REXX.EXE. To set this up, add a command like
this to your AUTOEXEC.BAT file:
set .rex=d:\path\rexx.exe
where "d:\path" is the drive and directory where REXX.EXE is
stored. Once this executable extension is set up, REXX programs
will run as though the Batch Manager was installed. Note,
however, that the Batch Manager would attempt the execution of
REXX programs before .BAT files, whereas 4DOS executable
extensions are executed after .BTM and .BAT files.
Personal REXX also provides the ADDRESS DOS statement, which
allows the REXX program to pass commands to the DOS command
processor. This function is implemented through the undocumented
INT 2E interface to the command processor, which can be enabled
in 4DOS with the FullINT2E=Yes directive in 4DOS.INI. If you use
FullINT2E=Yes and have trouble with ADDRESS DOS, use Personal
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 26
REXX's OPTIONS NEWCOM, or an environment variable, SET
RXNEWCOM=YES, to force ADDRESS DOS to shell to a new copy of
4DOS. Note that the normal Personal REXX ADDRESS DOS function
permits the environment to be permanently modified, whereas using
OPTIONS NEWCOM, or setting the environment variable will not
permit this. Quercus Systems discourages the use of the INT 2E
approach in DOS 4.00 or later, and Personal REXX will default to
not using INT 2E with these versions of DOS.
QEMM and QRAM (Quarterdeck):
The information below was obtained from tests with QEMM versions
5 and 6, and user reports on QRAM.
Both QEMM and QRAM are compatible with 4DOS, and will allow you
to load the 4DOS resident code and the master environment into
high DOS memory (UMBs) via the UMBLoad and UMBEnvironment
directives in 4DOS.INI. For these directives to work with QRAM
you must have QEXT loaded also (this is the normal method of
loading QRAM).
QEMM's Stealth mode is compatible with 4DOS, but can decrease
general system stability on some systems. If you have unusual
problems or system hangs with Stealth turned on, try turning it
off and see if the problems clear up (this is the procedure
recommended by Quarterdeck in their Stealth documentation).
QEMM allocates both XMS and EMS memory from the same memory area.
Therefore it always reports the exact same amount of free XMS and
EMS memory. You will see this in the free EMS and free XMS
values displayed by the 4DOS MEMORY command -- they will be
exactly the same under QEMM. Just remember that if both values
are (say) 512K, that means you have 512K of free memory which can
be allocated either way -- not 1024K!
If you use FILES.COM to load part of the DOS file handle table
into high memory, you must follow Quarterdeck's recommendations
and keep a minimum of FILES=8 in CONFIG.SYS. Lower values may
cause 4DOS to hang during boot, especially if disk swapping is
used.
If you use QEMM's OPTIMIZE and your AUTOEXEC has 4DOS-specific
commands like GLOBAL, IFF, aliases, etc., OPTIMIZE will recognize
them based on the 4DOS.CMD file distributed with QEMM 6. Note
that in QEMM version 6.00 this file is incomplete in that it does
not include the ELSE, ELSEIFF, and ENDIFF commands; you should
add these commands to 4DOS.CMD if you use them in your AUTOEXEC
file. This error in 4DOS.CMD was corrected in version 6.01 of
QEMM. To use 4DOS.CMD it must be renamed to OPTIMIZE.EXC before
running OPTIMIZE; see your QEMM documentation for details.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 27
OPTIMIZE cannot take account of the fact that 4DOS may be loaded
high with UMBLoad = Yes in 4DOS.INI, and therefore may not give
the best optimization results when UMBLoad = Yes is used
(OPTIMIZE has this problem with all programs which load
themselves into UMBs, not just with 4DOS). Some users also
report that OPTIMIZE is unstable on their systems when UMBLoad =
Yes is used.
RBase (MicroRim): [**]
When used with 4DOS disk swapping, RBase closes 4DOS's swap file
when it exits. This generates "4DOS Unrecoverable error DS" and
other similar fatal error messages. You can avoid this problem
by changing 4DOS swapping to go to EMS or XMS, or by setting
SwapReopen = Yes in 4DOS.INI.
RoboComm Communications Software: [**]
If you have trouble shelling out of RoboComm (for example, to use
an external protocol like DSZ), try increasing the setting for
Files and Extract memory to 256K.
Software Carousel (SoftLogic Solutions):
Please see the general section on multitaskers in chapter 7 of
the manual before reading this section.
The information below was obtained from tests with Software
Carousel version 3, and discussions with SoftLogic technical
support. It applies to all versions of Software Carousel.
Software Carousel will not work properly with 4DOS loaded as the
primary shell. It is designed with the assumption that
COMMAND.COM is the system command processor, and contains logic
which specifically depends on COMMAND.COM and the way it is
written, and which actually modifies the copy of COMMAND.COM in
memory. This makes it impossible to write a program which works
properly as an alternate command processor loaded underneath
(i.e. before) Software Carousel.
However, 4DOS can be run without difficulty inside a Software
Carousel partition, if the instructions below are followed.
When loading 4DOS into a Carousel partition, the best method is
to leave the COMSPEC set to COMMAND.COM when Carousel is loaded.
4DOS should then be set up in the Carousel options file just like
any other program. For example, to load 4DOS into partition 1:
d:\path\4DOS.COM [parameters] [filename]
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 28
where:
d:\path is the drive and path where 4DOS.COM is
located
[parameters] is any 4DOS command line parameters (/E,
@ininame, etc.; do NOT use /P here)
[filename] is the name of a batch file to be executed
when the partition is started
To use different 4DOS.INI files for different Software Carousel
partitions, use the "@ininame" parameter in the "parameters"
section of your Carousel setup to invoke a specific file. For
example, the parameters could be set to @D:\WP\4DOSWP.INI to use
that initialization file for the WP partition.
Because 4DOS can only be loaded in a partition when running
Software Carousel, and not as the primary command processor,
using 4DOS disk swapping in multiple partitions is subject to the
cautionary note on this subject in the general information
section on multitaskers in the manual; please read it carefully.
As stated in that note, if you use disk swapping you will
probably want to use the UniqueSwapName directive in 4DOS.INI to
avoid swap file name conflicts.
TSRCOM Utilities (TurboPower Software):
The TSRCOM utilities will work properly with 4DOS as long as you
use TSRCOM version 2.6 or later. The current release is version
3.4, and is available on the 4DOS Utility Disk and on many
bulletin boards and on-line systems.
If you use TSRCOM's MARK and RELEASE to manage your TSRs, 4DOS
swapping (as set with the SWAPPING command) must be in the same
state when RELEASE is run as it was when MARK (or FMARK) was run.
This is a characteristic of the design of MARK and RELEASE (or
any other such products), and not a bug. If you do not observe
this rule (for example, if you run MARK with SWAPPING OFF in
AUTOEXEC and later run RELEASE from the prompt with SWAPPING ON),
you may receive unusual error messages or hang your system. The
same restriction applies to MARKNET and RELNET.
UltraVision (Personics):
The DE program distributed with UltraVision is written
specifically for COMMAND.COM, and cannot be used to set directory
colors with 4DOS. Use 4DOS's built-in directory colorization
instead.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 29
Windows 3.0 and 3.1 (Microsoft):
Most information about Windows 3.0 is in chapter 7 of the manual.
4DOS has been tested thoroughly and works well with Windows 3.1;
the instructions in the manual on Windows 3.0 also apply to
Windows 3.1. (See the section on PATH problems below for one
caution related to the Setup Applications program in Windows
3.0.)
4.02 Under some circumstances you may find that Windows overrides the
environment size specified in your 4DOS.INI file, and creates a
smaller environment. This can leave insufficient environment
space for your 4DOS sessions running under Windows. If you
experience this problem, edit the SYSTEM.INI file in your Windows
directory, and find the section labelled [NonWindowsApp]. Add
the following line to this section:
CommandEnvSize = 0
This tells Windows not to force a particular environment size,
which will allow 4DOS to set the size itself.
If you set up a PIF file for a 4DOS window, please note that the
4DOS MEMORY command will report the maximum amount of EMS memory
which Windows can theoretically make available in that window.
Because Windows provides a virtual memory capability, this number
may be much larger than the size of physical RAM. For example,
if you set the EMS Limit in your PIF file to -1, Windows will
report total EMS memory of 64 MB to 4DOS as this is the
theoretical limit on Windows' virtual memory manager. Virtual
memory figures which give the appearance of excess memory are a
feature of Windows, and not a bug in 4DOS.
XyWrite (XyQuest): [**]
XyWrite's "shell to DOS" capability shells to COMMAND.COM, even
if you have your COMSPEC variable set to 4DOS. The only way we
know of to work around the problem is to make a copy of 4DOS.COM
and call it COMMAND.COM. If you do this, be sure to save the
real COMMAND.COM in another directory in case you need it for
another purpose. Some users have reported that the same problem
occurs with Signature, a newer word processor from XyQuest.
Programs Requiring PATH to be Under 128 Characters:
The following programs contain bugs which prevent them from
working properly if you have a PATH which is over 128 characters
long. Since 4DOS allows you to create a PATH up to 255
characters long this can appear to be a conflict between the
program involved and 4DOS. If your path is longer than 128
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 30
characters, see the section headed "Solving Software
Compatibility Problems" in chapter 7 of the manual for
information on creating a batch file to reduce the PATH length
while one of these programs is running.
Checkit (Touchstone): [**] Checkit version 3 requires a
path length under 128 characters.
Computer Select CD-ROM (Ziff-Davis): [**] Computer Select
cannot find its help program if your PATH is over 128
characters long.
RenderMan (AutoDesk): RenderMan will hang your system if it
is started with a PATH longer than 128 characters.
VINES Network (Banyan): [**] VINES' installation may not
work properly if your PATH is longer than 128 characters.
Windows 3.0 (Microsoft): The Windows 3 Setup Applications
option, which scans your disk drives for applications to be
added to Windows program groups, will not work properly if
your PATH is more than 128 characters long. This problem is
fixed in Windows 3.1.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 31
Software For Use With 4DOS
--------------------------
We receive many requests for recommendations on software that works well
with 4DOS, or that we have found especially useful.
While we can't recommend what will work well on your system or to meet
your needs, we can tell you what packages we have used and found
valuable. We will confine our comments to our primary area of expertise
-- system software -- and avoid discussing applications programs like
spreadsheets and word processors.
Please note that this is NOT actually a list of what works well with
4DOS -- the answer to that is, almost everything! And remember this is
only our opinions -- you need to choose what will work best for you.
Memory Managers: We generally use 386MAX and BlueMax (Qualitas) on
our own systems because we find it offers some important technical
advantages, and takes a conservative approach to memory management.
This approach may leave slightly less memory available on some
systems, but in our view this is a small price to pay for the
increased reliability provided by more conservative memory management
techniques. Many 4DOS users also report excellent results with QEMM
(Quarterdeck), and we use it at times as well. We have less
experience with other memory managers like Netroom (Helix) and Memory
Commander (V Communications), so we can't comment on them.
Task Switchers: For switching between applications which run one at
a time, the primary products we're aware of are Back & Forth
(Progressive Solutions) and Software Carousel (SoftLogic). This
category is an exception to our "everything works well with 4DOS"
rule: Software Carousel does work with 4DOS, but is designed to
depend on COMMAND.COM and requires special care when used with 4DOS
(see above for details). Back & Forth works seamlessly with 4DOS,
and many 4DOS users are enthusiastic about its features, support, and
price. Back & Forth contains a number of features specifically
created with 4DOS in mind (for example, it knows that .BTM files are
executable like batch files), and JP Software and Progressive
Solutions communicate regularly to make sure that 4DOS and Back &
Forth continue to work well together.
Disk Caches: There are dozens of products available in this
category. We use Super PC-Kwik (MultiSoft), HyperDisk (Hyperware),
and SmartDrive (Microsoft), and have found all of them to be reliable
and to work well with 4DOS. We can't speak from any direct
experience about other caching programs.
Disk Expanders: We have had excellent results using Stacker (Stac
Electronics) to expand disk drive space. We currently run Stacker on
both notebook and desktop systems. We sometimes get a little less
than Stac's claimed 2:1 disk space savings, but this is a minor point
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 32
compared to Stacker's reliability, speed, and value. We have also
tested the DBLSPACE utility included with MS-DOS 6.0, and it works
well with 4DOS 4.02. We haven't used DBLSAPCE extensively enough to
comment on its overall reliability. There are other products which
perform the same function; we have not used or evaluated any of them.
Video Utilities: We use UltraVision (Personics) regularly on all of
our systems which have VGA video or better, and we use Laptop
UltraVision on laptop or notebook systems. UltraVision allows
excellent control over all aspects of VGA and EGA video systems
including fonts, colors, and screen sizes. It is fully compatible
with 4DOS and many 4DOS users have found it to be a valuable tool.
We are not aware of any other products which do what UltraVision
does. ANSI-UV.SYS which comes with UltraVision is an excellent ANSI
driver; we also use ANSI.COM from PC Magazine.
Boot Utilities: We can't speak about this issue from any distance
because we sell one such utility, BOOT.SYS, and use it on all our
systems. BOOT.SYS was the first of these utilities to allow
selection of a configuration during the boot process, and is an
excellent tool for configuration management. There are other
products in this category but we are not familiar with them.
4DOS 4.02 [3-30-93] APPNOTES.DOC page 33