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BESTPROG.TXT
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BESTPROG.TXT (All rights reserved) Wed 15-May-1996
Timo's subjective choice of best PD & SW MS-DOS material
--------------------------------------------------------
Note that this list is subjective reflecting my own usages. Hence
one cannot "submit" to this list, as some users and authors have
done after this list has become fairly widespread. Comments and
views are naturally welcome, nevertheless. You are free to quote
brief passages from my text provided you clearly indicate the source
with an acknowledgment. Please do not distribute any part of this
package separately.
The addresses of some of the authors can be found in the since
discontinued
41223 Dec 17 1995 ftp://garbo.uwasa.fi/pc/pd2/author35.zip
author35.zip Email addresses of 255 MS-DOS shareware and PD authors
Not surprisingly many of the selections that were on the original
list were utilities that complemented what the earlier MS-DOS
versions lacked. I have moved the consequently outdated selections
to a separate file earlybst.txt in this same collection.
asa55c-?.zip The As-Easy-As spreadsheet. At time of writing of
this item we only have one shareware spreadsheet to
offer from Garbo, but it is all that is needed. This
123 and VP planner compatible spreadsheet gives all
the basic functions needed in a good spreadsheet
including useful graphics plotting. Highly
recommended.
cshow904.zip Much of the information and even recreation comes in
the form of GIF pictures. For example, Garbo
archives now have an extensive collection of select
astronomy images. These required a good viewer, like
Bob Berry's the CompuShow GIF viewer both with with
a traditional and dialog interface. I prefer the
former and have listed that version. Bob has been
improving his program constantly. The recent
versions can utilize the full properties of the
video card, thus giving very sharp images when the
video adapter is capable of it.
dc106f.zip Directory control from the PC-Magazine by Michael
Mefford. A simple, but a very useful point and shoot
facility to copy, move, rename, or delete files. DC
is an excellent example of the fact that a good
program doesn't need to be over-packed with features
nor need it be flashy. There is also an advanced
rendition df460.zip by Gordon Haff called Directory
Freedom. The interface is the same but there are
much more options, and the program is very
configurable. Also highly recommended. But I have a
nagging suspicion, with no hard evidence whatsoever,
that DF sometimes causes confusion on the disk.
dcf52.zip A fast 1-pass copying facility for floppies. One of
the most irksome MS-DOS task is copying a floppy in
a single drive. (Also finally seen to in the latest
MS-DOS versions, I hear.) I have been looking for a
suitable 1-pass program to recommend for quite
awhile, and found quite a few, and this one is it.
It has a nice interface and is fast since it can
skip the empty sections. A simple but useful
alternative to look at is xdcpy200.zip. Another
option worth looking at is the more professional
copyq322.zip.
dirmat31.zip Dirmatch for comparing & manipulating two dirs side
by side. Another really great utility from Michael
Mefford. Originally appeared in the PC-Magazine.
dirx110.zip A shell for listing and handling lzexe and pklite
etc. compressed executables. A very useful companion
to lzexe and pklite. Nothing is perfect, though. The
documentation leaves much to be desired in a top
utility. But the basic idea is very sound. Most
importantly to my knowledge there are no
alternatives (which is rather odd) so dirx is left
to hold the field at the moment despite its faults
and the non-support. Strangely, the author has shown
no interest whatsoever in the feedback I have tried
to give on the configuration problems with the
program. Fortunately such a supercilious attitude is
not common among the authors.
dosclip.com "A TSR utility that provides Windows-like
cut-and-paste facilities to applications running
under DOS". A PC-Magazine utility by Douglas Boling
in vol11n07.zip. I use it for example for cutting
and pasting commands and data when being connected,
using MS-DOS Kermit or Telnet, to your Unix hosts
Garbo and Chyde. The only problem is that the hot
keys are too common and may thus interfere with
other applications. For a patch see
ftp://garbo.uwasa.fi/pc/pd2/tspost09.zip.
fed153.zip FileEDit binary editor for MS-DOS by Phillip Nickel.
Binary (or rather hexadecimal) editors are
specialized utilities needed only occasionally for
advanced usage. As with ASCII editors the choice of
one's binary editor is a matter of taste and there
are other goods ones like the MicroEMACS-like
beav140.zip. See Garbo's /pc/binedit/ directory for
the the other, more often updated alternatives like
hex51.zip.
fp-219.zip The honors of virus scanning will now go to Virus
Protection system by Fridrik Skulason. It is free
for private users while it is fully commercial to
institutional usage. All the tests I have seen have
ranked it very highly both for its user interface
and its virus detecting and protection capacity.
Naturally there are other scanners, too, like
McAfee's established Scan and the very fast TBAV
from the Netherlands. All available from Garbo's
/pc/virus directory.
ftp-list.zip Anonymous FTP FAQ and Site Listing by Perry Rovers.
Frequently updated. This list has changed maintainer
several times during the last few years, and they
all have done a good job. But Perry has taken this
lists to new heights. Quite an impressive feat of
record keeping. There is also a specialized list for
MS-DOS FTP sites which I maintain. It is /pc/pd2/
moder58.zip. Both lists are heavily downloaded from
Garbo.
geoclk70.zip GeoClock by Joseph R Ahlgren is an interesting,
specialized program. It is a world map with a moving
day/night grayline. It can be used for displaying
locations of, for example FTP sites, on the world
map.
gifcm133.zip GIF Commentor to embed/remove text comments by J.
Lee. This is practically a maintainer's utility. It
allows deleting and inserting text comments into GIF
image files. It has been of much use to me in
preparing the astronomy and campus GIFs for Garbo.
gsz0607.zip Full-screen version of Zmodem file transfer
protocol. Chuck Forsberg's Zmodem has become the
veritable standard of file transfers from BBSes and
between PCs and hosts. GSZ brings the visual
interface to DSZ that has been formerly lacking
while it has