¢¢ DOS XE review, by Paul Allton.¢¢¢¢ DOS 2.5 was probably one of the most simple, user-friendly disk operating systems ever written. Which explains, in a nutshell, why it is so popular. But it certainly had its limitations - it was not terribly advanced, and made no provision for future technology and enhancements.¢¢ Fear not, because Atari's latest - DOS XE - is at last available in the UK. It works very well with any drive, but for despairing XF-551 owners (like myself) its arrival is a Godsend. At last, a DOS enabling full use of the XF, with double-sided, double-density formats - a total of 360K on a single disk. Also supported are the 810, 1050, and modified 1050s (with true double-density - 180K each side of the disk).¢¢ Into the drive with the disk, power on. As normal, the disk loads and you are thrown into Basic, with the familiar "READY" prompt. Then the first suprise - you type DOS and expect the drive to burst into life, but it does not. Instead, the DOS menu instantly appears on the screen - no more loading from a disk is necessary.¢¢ This is because DOS XE uses the familiar bank switching technique. This disk utility package is hidden under the operating system, and is simply switched into memory when required. This still leaves you 32274 bytes free in Basic. Any Basic program is kept intact while accessing DOS, without the need for a MEM.SAV.¢¢ The only disadvantage of this, is that software using the same area of memory as DOS XE will not work. Unfortunately, Turbo-Basic is one of these programs - a pity. But, I know for a fact that some people only use Turbo because they can't be bothered to go through all that loading and disk-swapping involved with going to DOS. For obvious reasons, DOS XE would be very suitable for them.¢¢ The next suprise - instead of the usual cramped-up screen, you are presented with a main menu with four options: File access menu, Machine language access menu, System function menu, and of course the obligatory Exit to Basic/cartridge (except when Basic is disabled).¢¢ File access is precisely what it sounds like. All the usual commands are there (directory, lock, unlock, delete, copy, rename, format, etc.), plus a few others such as appending and viewing.¢¢ DOS XE also allows sub-directories (with up to 360K on a disk, you'll soon see why!) So, options to delete, make, and choose the working directory are also included.¢¢ Moving on to Machine language access. This is another area where DOS XE scores highly over its predecessor. As in DOS 2.5 you can run/save binary files, and go to a machine language prog. (i.e. run at address), you may also append to a binary file, and load a binary file into memory without running it. The latter is particularly interesting because you can then display (and change) selected areas of memory. Each address is displayed in ATASCII and hex, rather like a disk sector editor. It does not really mean a lot to a novice like me, but I am sure more advanced users would find it very useful and interesting.¢¢ The system function menu has just a few options, as well as directory and working directory (available in all menus). There is also an "allow DOS 2.x access" option. When selected a small file is loaded and run. This allows access to DOS 2.x disks by using A: as a prefix, rather than D:. It is not a convertor program as such, you have to copy each file in turn via the DOS COPY option, from your DOS 2.x disk to a DOS XE disk, which is painfully slow. Some people would prefer a convertor program I am sure, but the menu says "allow DOS 2.x access" and that's exactly what it means. You can read a text file, run binary files, etc., without having to convert them first, which I personally consider to be more use.¢¢ For those of you unfortunate enough to have been using DOS 3, there is a program on the disk to convert files to DOS XE format.¢¢ At the moment DOS XE has no documentation files. The program itself is Public Domain, but the manual is copyrighted and cannot be copied freely. But it's not really needed - DOS XE is very easy to use. After ten minutes playing around you won't have any problems. Because all the commands have been changed (E.g. directory=files listing, delete=erase) you may be confused for a bit. This is because to choose an option you type the first letter and press return. But once you've learnt the new names, it's easy - a joy to use, and a great improvement over the old system. You can select what you want without having to look up at the screen, or re-printing the menu.¢¢ There are a couple more flashy features not mentioned yet, such as batch processing. You can type in a series of commands on one line, then the computer carries them out, answering all the prompts, etc. If you find yourself repeating certain tasks just too frequently, you can store them on disk and run them as required with the "run batch file" on the system menu.¢¢ Even the directory has been changed, meaning "less sector counts" have been done away with. The size of a file is now displayed in bytes. This seems odd at first, but is a great idea. DOS XE is also capable of date stamping files, another nice touch, fairly useful and a good way of showing off!¢¢ Overall, there's not much more I can say - DOS XE is excellent, streets ahead of DOS 2.5. If it had been more readily available a few years ago, with everyone using it now, it would have earned the Atari 8-bit a great deal of respect. Sadly, though, DOS XE will never replace DOS 2.5. Software support is virtually non-existant (although it might be better in the States). The only software I know of that directly supports it, is Diamond GOS (the two of which, I am told, makes a very powerful combination).¢¢ Admittadly, it's not SpartaDOS, but it's not 50 pound either (that's assuming you can get it now Frontier has deserted us). Myself, I quite simply refuse to pay 50 pound for a disk operating system. Anyway, DOS XE does all I need it to. It's the next best thing to Sparta. If you have an XF-551 you HAVE to get DOS XE. But whatever drive you own, it comes highly recommended.¢¢ At the very least it will give your lovable old Atari a facelift (don't you just get fed up of that boring old DOS 2.5 menu?), but investigating further will uncover a highly efficeint means of file management.¢¢ One of the best 2 pounds I have spent for ages. Eternal thanks to Dean Garraghty for making it available over here.¢¢¢ --------------------------¢¢ Thanks to Paul Allton for this article. Hope the new hand was reasonably priced, Paul!¢
