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U S T E R E O S H E L L version 4.10 * User documentation * M.R.E. Software (c) copyright 1989-93 ========================================================================== ,--------------------, ,----------, ,---------------------, | | | VIEWER | | | | ........ | |----------| | ........ | | .............. | | EDITOR | | .............. | | ................ | |----------| | ................ | | ................ | | 10 LNCH. | | ................ | | .............. | |----------| | .............. | | ........ | | 10 USER | | ........ | | | |----------| | | | | | 8 COMPRS.| | | | ..... .. | |----------| | .. ..... | | ....... `..' | | 8 SPEC. | | `..' ....... | | ..... | ,---`----------'---, | ..... | | Stereo |--| MS-DOS ........ |--| Shell | `--------------------' `------------------' `---------------------' * The components of power * ========================================================================== == == == ======================================== DOS never sounded this good before! ======================================== == == == ========================================================================== .---------. (tm) Published by: ,-----'---, | -------------------------- --| |o |------------------ M.R.E. Software | .-----'---. | Association of 206 E. Jones St. | | |-' Shareware West Point, Ms. 39773 `---| o | Professionals -------------------------- ------| | |-------------------- Emery D. Wooten Jr. `---------' MEMBER (C.) Copyright 1989-93 Microsystems Research and Engineering (C.) Copyright 1989-93 Emery D. Wooten Jr. Stereo Shell, M.R.E. Software, Microsystems Research and Engineering (TM)s * All rights reserved worldwide * U C O N T E N T S _____________________________________________________________________ PREFACE ......................................................... I HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS ........................................... II PART 1 ** INITIAL SETUP Sec. 1.1 INTRODUCTION .................................... 1-1 Sec. 1.2 THE STS DEFAULT SETUP ........................... 1-1 Sec. 1.3 RUNNING STS THE FIRST TIME ...................... 1-2 Sec. 1.4 HOW TO FULLY TUNE STEREO SHELL .................. 1-3 Sub-Sec. 1.4.1 SCREEN AND MOUSE OPTIONS ............. 1-3 Sub-Sec. 1.4.2 COLOR SETUP .......................... 1-4 Sub-Sec. 1.4.3 FILES/EXTERNAL SETUP ................. 1-5 Sub-Sec. 1.4.4 PROTECTED OPTIONS .................... 1-8 Sub-Sec. 1.4.5 SAVE SETTINGS AND EXIT ............... 1-9 Sub-Sec. 1.4.6 EXIT NO SAVE ......................... 1-10 PART 2 ** USING STEREO SHELL Sec. 2.1 INTRODUCTION .................................... 2-1 Sec. 2.2 THE StS DISPLAY ................................. 2-2 Sub-Sec. 2.2.1 THE FILE WINDOWS ..................... 2-3 Sub-Sec. 2.2.2 THE CHG.DIR. WINDOW .................. 2-4 Sub-Sec. 2.2.3 THE TITLE AND FUNCTION KEY AREA ...... 2-5 Sec. 2.3 StS DIRECT KEYS AND COMMANDS .................... 2-5 Sub-Sec. 2.3.1 THE CURSOR AND SCREEN KEYS ........... 2-5 Sub-Sec. 2.3.2 THE LETTER, NUMBER, AND MARKING KEYS . 2-6 Sub-Sec. 2.3.3 THE COMMAND KEYS ..................... 2-9 Sub-Sec. 2.3.4 MOUSE CONTROL ........................ 2-11 Sub-Sec. 2.3.5 FILENAME CONVENTIONS ................. 2-12 Sec. 2.4 THE DOS MENU .................................... 2-12 Sec. 2.5 THE GENERAL FILES MENU .......................... 2-13 Sec. 2.6 MARKED FILES MENUS .............................. 2-16 Sub-Sec. 2.6.1 THE MARKING CRITERIA MENU ............ 2-16 Sub-Sec. 2.6.2 THE MARKED FILES MENU ................ 2-18 Sec. 2.7 THE EXE COM BAT MENU ............................ 2-19 Sec. 2.8 THE FILE COMPRESSOR MENU ........................ 2-20 Sub-Sec. 2.8.1 THE I/O REDIRECTION MENU ............. 2-23 Sub-Sec. 2.8.2 THE EXTENDED ZIP MENU ................ 2-23 Sec. 2.9 THE INTERNAL VIEW UTILITY ....................... 2-25 Sec. 2.10 USEFUL NOTES AND HINTS .......................... 2-26 APPENDIX A ** COMPRESSION UTILITY INTERFACING .................. A-1 APPENDIX B ** LICENSE/WARRANTY ................................. A-1 Sec. B.1 LICENSE ......................................... B-1 Sec. B.2 WARRANTY ........................................ B-2 Sec. B.3 TRADEMARKS ...................................... B-2 APPENDIX C ** StS REGISTRATION ................................. C-1 Sec. C.1 WHY SHOULD I REGISTER ? ......................... C-1 Sec. C.2 REGISTRATION FEES ............................... C-2 Sec. C.3 SITE LICENSE/QUANTITY DISCOUNT .................. C-2 Sec. C.4 THE MRE SOFTWARE BBS ............................ C-3 Sec. C.5 REGISTRATION FORM ............................... C-4 I PREFACE _____________________________________________________________________ Stereo Shell is a unique DOS shell utility program. This program provides two fully independent file/directory displays which enable it to provide extremely powerful, yet simple, file handling functions. The twin, or if you will, stereo display allows the user to perform file operations such as move and copy between any two drives, or directories, or combinations of drive/directories on the machine without ever typing a file or path name. Stereo Shell also offers many more exciting features. A full complement of standard DOS functions is provided. These include the well known move, copy, erase, etc. and all in stereo! A built in view as well as a user defined editor, 10 user defined file utility programs, and 10 user defined launchable programs serve to enhance the power and usefulness of the program to the maximum. Complicated pro- cedures are simplified by intelligent menus that appear when a file is selected. These menus are selected by the program based on the file type and offer the most frequently needed functions for that type of file in top-down order allowing quick, effortless operation. All ten function keys are also "hot" providing more experienced users with instant action. And we haven't forgotten the mouse, full rodent support is built in. Eight possible file compression programs are also supported by Stereo Shell! Stereo Shell has built-in menus and a file handling system to support ARC, ZIP, LZH, PAK, ARJ, and 3 spare compression programs. This system provides a virtually complete, programmable, and effortless interface to these excellent compression utilities. Our system uses the actual utility programs, not some kind of built in approximation of the real thing. This ensures that the compressed files are truly compatible and it also allows simple updates to revised versions of the various file compression programs without the need to update StS itself. Stereo Shell provides a great shell environment for your everyday activities. Its ease of use and ability to execute files while taking only a meager 45Kb of RAM makes it a refreshing change from the hum-drum character based MS-DOS or some of those plain old mono directory utilities. StS is also absolutely perfect as an executable utility program for Procomm (tm) or other communications packages since it provides the means to view directories, edit files, and even extract and execute files from compressed library files, all while still on-line! There is much more! Please give this program a full test on your system. We know you'll agree, DOS never sounded this good before. Stereo Shell......The hi-fidelity DOS shell. II HARDWARE REQUIREMENTS _____________________________________________________________________ StS will run on the IBM PC-XT-AT-PCjr-PS/2 and all true compatibles. The general system requirements are outlined below. Memory .......... 128 Kb. minimum. Shrinks its own memory usage to about 45Kb while executing external programs. Operating sys. .. MS/PC DOS version 2.11 or later. Video ........... The MDA, CGA, MCGA, EGA, and VGA video adapters or any adapters that can emulate these are supported. StS offers the 25/28/43/50 line modes on supported video adapters and systems. Full 16 color text mode is provided on all but the MDA. Screen writing is user selectable between BIOS and direct modes. Disk ............ All disk I/O is controlled through standard DOS function calls. Stereo Shell was designed primarily for hard disk based systems and at least one hard disk is recommended. Network systems.. StS version 4.10 has been tested on the Novell (tm) network software with excellent results. 1-1 _____________________________________________________________________ >> PART 1 INITIAL SETUP _____________________________________________________________________ >> Sec. 1.1 INTRODUCTION _____________________________________________________________________ StS has an integrated external setup program to allow the user to configure it to his system and requirements. "Integrated external" means that the setup program is actually a separate program that is automatically executed by StS and appears to be an integral part of STS.EXE. The advantage of an integrated external program over a built-in setup routine is a significant savings in runtime memory usage. Since the program is integrated, it works just like a part of StS and thus does not require any additional work by the user. The external setup program is named STSETxxx.EXE where the 'xxx' refers to the version number of StS with which the external setup program was designed to work. For example in StS version 4.10 the setup program is named STSET410.EXE. IN ORDER FOR STEREO SHELL TO FIND AND EXECUTE THE SETUP PROGRAM, IT MUST EXIST SOMEWHERE IN THE USER DEFINED DOS PATH. The following section will guide you through the initial execution of the StS program and the setup program features. >> Sec. 1.2 THE STS DEFAULT SETUP _____________________________________________________________________ StS comes pre-configured to run on what is considered the most likely system configuration. It assumes you have an IBM compatible video card and that your primary hard disk drive is C:. Although the program is totally re-settable with respect to these parameters, this will be your starting point. StS uses several external utility programs to accomplish the tasks of library file handling, editing, and listing. The default pathnames defined for these functions is C:\STEREO. It is highly recommended but not required that you create a sub-directory called STEREO on the root directory of your primary (C:) hard disk and place these files in it; PKZIP.EXE ........ ZIP file packer PKUNZIP.EXE ........ ZIP file un-packer PKPAK.EXE ........ ARC file packer PKUNPAK.EXE ........ ARC file un-packer LHARC.EXE ........ LZH file utility PAK.EXE ........ PAK file utility ARJ.EXE ........ ARJ file utility LIST???.COM ........ ASCII file list program E88.EXE ........ ASCII text editor (available from M.R.E.) 1-2 If you do not have all of these programs or do not want to move them, no problem. The creation of this sub-directory and the availability of all these programs should only be considered as a helpful suggestion. StS's initial paths are all set to C:\STEREO\ and setting up such a sub-directory will save time but StS can be easily configured to work otherwise. >> Sec. 1.3 RUNNING StS THE FIRST TIME _____________________________________________________________________ It is strongly suggested that the user create a sub-directory named STEREO and copy all of the files associated with StS into that sub-directory. If there is space on the C: drive for this sub-directory that is the recommended place for it. StS uses an integrated external setup program (see above) that must reside in the DOS path so it is also suggested that the user edit the path statement in the AUTOEXEC.BAT file to include the STEREO sub- directory. If you have no path statement, then add the following line to your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. PATH=C:\STEREO\ To execute StS, just type in STS at the DOS prompt like you would any other program. StS is not resident or special with respect to general operation with one exception. StS expects to find the COMSPEC environment string defined. In 99% of all cases MS-DOS has already done this job for you so no action is required by the user. In the event that StS does not find this string, it will report the error. If this happens, then simply add this statement to your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. SET COMSPEC = C:\COMMAND.COM If you are not running a hard disk, you should adjust the drive letter as required. When executed, the StS screen will appear on your display, in living black and white. The system defaults are set to direct screen writes which allow the program to operate on any type of IBM display compatible system. If your machine is not IBM display compatible, you will need to specify the /B switch on the DOS command line to force StS to use BIOS screen writes. ie. STS /B Users of very old IBM CGA cards may experience display "fetches" or "snow" on the display when StS is running. StS has a snow suppression option which may be used to correct this problem. --------------------------------------------------------------------- To turn snow suppression on: (1.) Press the <Alt> <S> key pair to go into setup mode. (2.) Press the <F1> function key to set Screen and Mouse settings. (3.) Press the <F1> function key to toggle Snow suppression < ON> (4.) Press the <Esc> key when you are finished playing with the other options. (5.) Press the <F4> key to save the change and exit setup mode. --------------------------------------------------------------------- 1-3 >> Sec. 1.4 HOW TO FULLY TUNE STEREO SHELL _____________________________________________________________________ This section will outline the operation of Stereo Shell's tuning control center. To fully exploit the power of StS, it is important that you understand the setup procedure. To enter the setup area, press the <Alt> <S> key pair. You should see a screen with five windows. In the upper left hand corner is a main menu area that provides access to the various other menus in the setup routine. We will examine each option in detail. * IF THE SETUP PROGRAM FAILS TO EXECUTE * Make sure the setup program STSETxxx.EXE is present either in the left window of the StS display or anywhere in the DOS path. (see above) Make sure the setup program matches the version of StS that you have. For example StS version 4.10 will have a setup program named STSET410.EXE. If you have edited the DOS path command in the AUTOEXEC.BAT file, it may be necessary to re-boot the machine to make the change effective. >> Sub Sec. 1.4.1 SCREEN AND MOUSE OPTIONS _____________________________________________________________________ (F1) Screen and Mouse settings allow you to set various operational parameters. The sub-menu options are listed below. (F1) Snow suppression. This option is provided for users of older IBM display adapters. It prevents flicker when the screen is updated while in direct video mode. If you have an older display adapter you will want to toggle this option ON. To toggle the option simply press the <F1> key. If you do not have a snow problem, leave this option off for fastest operation. (F2) Exploding windows. Looks sharp and makes noise. Toggle it by pressing <F2> (F3) Date/Time display. For users who find the ticking clock irritating or for those who don't know or care what time or day it is. Toggle by pressing <F3>. (F4) Sound effects. Enables or disables all sound effects in StS. (F5) Screen saver. (3 modes) The StS screen saver will clear the video display to black after ten minutes of keyboard inactivity. Unlike the other options in this section, the screen saver is a 3 mode option. The (OFF) mode will disable the feature entirely. The ( ON) mode will simply clear the screen to black. The (MSG) mode will randomly "bounce" a message around on the screen prompting the user to press a key. The screen saver is only in effect when the StS screen is active. It will NOT blank the screen while the user is executing another 1-4 application from Stereo. The screen saver is also a simple "clear the screen to black" type, it does no fancy or dan- gerous tricks with the video display adapter. (F6) Wrap around file windows. If on, the file and directory windows will allow the cursor to wrap around from top to bottom, bottom to top when the cursor moves past the first/last file. When the wrap around occurs, the speaker will beep to indicate it. (F7) Sub-directory memory. This option determines how the program operates when the user changes sub-directories using the center window of StS. With the memory off (default), the cursor will always appear at the top (on the double dots) after a directory change. With the memory on, the program will "remember" the path that was taken when the user went "deeper" into the tree and place the cursor on the approiate sub-directories as he goes back toward the root. (F8) File descipt. on-line. This option enables/disables the 4DOS(tm) compatible file description on-line mode. When enabled, the file description (if any) for the currently hilighted file will be displayed on the StS screen as the cursor is moved through the list of files. The description appears over the Stereo Shell title/copyright near the bottom of the screen. The on-line display will cause a slight delay when reading directory information due to the extra time required to find and read the DESCRIPT.ION file. This is more noticable when reading slower floppy disk drives. (F9) Printer Port This option allows the user to select the default printer port used by the StS internal viewer. LPT1, LPT2, or LPT3 are allowed. (F10) Mouse sensitivity. Does not refer to the emotional state of the rodent. This option is provided to allow the user to adjust the speed of the mouse. To set this value, press <F7> which will print instructions and the current value. Use the <+> and <-> keys to change the value, press <CR> when you are satisfied. <Esc.> Press the <Esc> key to return to the main menu. >> Sub Sec. 1.4.2 COLOR SETUP _____________________________________________________________________ (F2) Color Setup (main screen) This option allows the user to set the screen window colors. Use the number keys listed in the menu to set your desired screen colors and press <CR> when satisfied. We have provided a "magic key" (key #9) that will give you a default color setup to examine. 1-5 The setting of the colors abides by the following sequence. [ black, blue, green, cyan, red, magenta, brown, white ] Foreground colors will cycle through 16 shades of these colors while background colors use only the low intensity 8. (F3) Color Set (borders) This option allows the user to adjust the border colors and hi-lite bar color. Its operation is identical to (F2) above. >> Sub Sec. 1.4.3 FILES/EXTERNAL SETUP _____________________________________________________________________ (F4) Files/external setup StS interfaces to various external programs to allow the user to process compressed files, edit files, and more. This option will allow you to define the programs and location of these programs on your system. First we need to define some general rules for the program descriptions. These rules apply to all programs defined under the option. GENERAL RULES FOR EXTERNAL FILE SPECIFICATION (1.) Include the drive letter. Unless you absolutely plan to use StS only on one drive you will need to include a drive letter on all program descriptions. (2.) Include the full and complete path from the root. StS uses the MS-DOS EXEC function to run these programs. The EXEC function does not search for the user defined PATH= string in the environment so you must explicitly tell StS where the file is located. (3.) Include the complete filename with the extension. The EXEC function does not assume a .COM or .EXE extension as does DOS itself. If the extension is not provided StS will be unable to execute the program. Example: Assume that my editor (E88.EXE) was located in a sub- directory I call GREAT which is itself a sub-directory of EDITORS located on my hard disk drive c. My string to define the Editor utl would be: C:\EDITORS\GREAT\E88.EXE (4.) In StS version 4.00+, the Editor, Viewer, User programs, and Launch programs are all defined with a virtually identical screen layout. There is an on-screen help box which gives a brief description of each item needed in the setup. A less brief description will now be provided. Path\name.ext: This is the path and name of the program to run as an external. Be sure to abide by notes 1,2, and 3, above when defining this item. An example of the proper use of this item would be when defining the editor pro- gram as shown in note 3 above. 1-6 Parameters...: Parameters are also known as command line switches. Many programs accept command line switches when they are executed from the DOS prompt. An example would be the /h switch in E88 which causes the program to run in 43 line EGA mode. Building on the example under note 3 above, to run E88 from the DOS command line in 43 line EGA mode we would type: C:\EDITORS\GREAT\E88.EXE /h To run E88 from StS in 43 line mode, the /h would be placed in the Parameter field. In some cases, the user may desire to run a program with different switches and choose those switches at runtime. StS provides a special technique to allow this. Placing a question mark in the parameter field will cause StS to prompt for the parameters each time the program is executed. Pass filename: Many programs can accept a filename on the DOS command line. Editors such as E88 are a great example of this fact. If a filename is passed to E88 it will automatically load that file for editing. Continuing with our example above, a DOS command line for E88 could be: C:\EDITORS\GREAT\E88.EXE /h STS.DOC where STS.DOC would be the file to be edited. Stereo Shell will automatically pick up the filename from the highlight bar on the screen and pass it to the external program if 'Y' is selected for the Pass filename option. Pass name 1st: The "standard" method for passing parameters and filenames to a program on the DOS command line is to pass the parameters before the filename as is shown in our E88 example. Notice the /h comes before the filename. Some programs do not abide by this protocol and StS provides an option to reverse the order in which the parameters and filename are passed. A program such as the popular LIST.COM from Buerg is an example of a program which wants the filename before any command line switches. Normally the Pass name 1st option should be set to 'N' but if the options do not work, try reversing the order by answering 'Y' to this option. Pause........: The pause option will cause StS to display a "Press any key" prompt before it destroys the screen and continues normal operations. This option is provided to allow users to read the screen output from programs that print infor- mation and terminate. The DOS utility CHKDSK is an example. Without the pause, it would be impossible to read the results from CHKDSK. 1-7 Menu wording.: This option applies only to USER programs. The text string defined here is the string that will appear on the USER menu when StS is running. Use this option to describe the USER program. For example if I decide to set up a file finder program as a USER program, I would write some- thing like "File finder program." in for the Menu wording. Extension key: This item applies only to the LAUNCH programs. A LAUNCH program is an application which StS can execute for the user when he selects a file with an extension that matches a data file extension for that program. For example, most BASIC programs carry the filename extension of .BAS. StS can be set up to optionally run BASIC and load the highlighted .BAS file. In other words BASIC can be "launched" because the user selected a .BAS file. The extension key defines the filename extension that will activate the LAUNCH option on the General Files Menu. Now that we have the general rules down, lets examine the specific options and types of external programs StS supports. (F1) Editor program. The editor may be ANY user defined text editor or word processor. StS provides an option to edit files on its file menus. When the edit option is selected, StS will execute the editor program defined here. The editor should be capable of accepting a filename on the command line. (F2) Viewer program. The viewer definition is optional. The user may define any external view program in a manner similar to the editor definition above. If the viewer is not defined by the user, StS will use its internal viewer routine. (F3) COMPRESSION programs. Selecting this option will open another menu window which allows one to select the particular compression program to set up. Once a type such as .ZIP is selected, a setup screen for that program appears. In general, the user should abide by the general rules for defining external programs as outlined above and also follow the on-screen help box. The intricacies of defining each compression program command will not be discussed at this time. Please see Appendix A in this .DOC file for details of the compression program setup. * * NOTICE * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Please see Appendix A in this .DOC file for information about * changing the actual file compression program commands. Do not * attempt to change these strings before reading Appendix A. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 1-8 (F4) USER programs. The user defined utility(s) can be ANY .EXE, .COM or .BAT file. These programs can be used for secondary editors, list programs, file finders, file conversion routines, frequently used applications, special compression commands, batch files for formatting floppies, custom viewers, the possibilities are endless. StS version 4.10 now supports up to 10 user defined utilities which each have a setup screen accessed from the sub-menu for this option. (F5) LAUNCH programs. Although the name LAUNCH may invoke mental images of a big Saturn rocket sitting poised to roar off into the wild blue yonder, the StS launch program is much quieter and easier to operate. Launchable programs allow the user to execute an application by selecting one of its data files. For example if a LAUNCH program is defined for the .BAS filename extension, an extra option will appear on the General Files Menu that will allow the user to run BASIC and load the data file automatically. Thus BASIC was launched. StS version 4.00+ supports up to 10 LAUNCH programs which each have a setup screen accessed from the sub-menu for this option. (F6) HELP File path/name. This option allows the user to define the name and location of the StS help file. The help file may be any ASCII text file. Follow the on-screen instructions to modify this option. (F7) WORKing directory setting. This is the default setting for the right side of the StS display. Stereo Shell uses this working directory as the default source and destination of files that will be included in, or extracted from, compressed files. This setting defaults to C:\ZDIR\ and it is recommended that the novice user not adjust this unless it is necessary. Unless your system for some reason does not have a C: drive with sufficient space on it, or you just can't stand the name ZDIR, it should not be necessary to change this path. If you do decide to adjust this, please follow the instructions provided on the screen carefully. Include the drive letter and the complete path from the root. This directory may at times contain large numbers of files and should not be setup on a floppy disk drive. >> Sub Sec. 1.4.5 PROTECTED OPTIONS _____________________________________________________________________ (F5) Protected options. This main menu option is provided to allow users and system managers to control access to some of Stereo Shell's setup options and menus. Note that this protection system is a very basic system which was designed to prevent the average user from seeing hidden files or changing external program setups. It can be defeated by most self respecting hackers but should severely limit "tinkering" by those who should not "tinker" anyway. 1-9 When selected this option will either open a sub-menu or prompt for a password if one has been previously set. The sub-menu options will now be presented. (F1) Hidden files displayed. When < ON> StS will "see" and display hidden files that reside on your disks. Hidden files will carry a small "h" hi-lighted by the date field in the list. (F2) User program changes. When < ON> users will be allowed access to the Files/external setup (main menu option) and change the editor, viewer, etc. programs. When <OFF> access to this main menu option will be denied. (F3) Allow shelling to DOS. When <OFF> users will not be allowed to execute an ALT-D DOS shell command. This prevents commands such as DIR and FORMAT from being executed directly from StS. It is worth noting that this has very limited usefullness since StS can execute programs (including COMMAND.COM) directly from the screen. If a system manager desires to prevent users from shelling to DOS by any means, modifications to other areas of the system must be made. This option serves only as an aid in the process of protecting a system. (F4) Password change/enable. HEED THE ON-SCREEN WARNING. Setting the password requires that it be remembered! If the password is forgotten, the only recourse is to erase the .CFG file and totally rebuild the setup. Once set, the password will be required to re-enter this sub-menu area. >> Sub Sec. 1.4.5 SAVE SETTINGS AND EXIT _____________________________________________________________________ (F6) Save settings and exit. This main menu option will save the settings you have defined and exit back to the StS main screen. The settings are saved in the root directory of the current disk drive in a file named STSCFG.CFG. In the event that you ever want to start over from the internal program default settings, simply erase this .CFG file before running StS. SETUP NOTE: You may set each window of the StS display to sort files in various manners by using the <F3> function key while running the main program. When you select option (F5) in setup mode your currently defined sort settings will be saved. The windows will then "come up" sorted as you have them defined each time you execute StS. 1-10 NOTE: An environment variable setting is provided to allow the user to "hard code" the configuration file name and location. This feature will allow you purists out there to put the config- uration file in some place other than the root directory. This also allows users who desire to run STS from various disk drives to ensure that STS will always be able to find the setup file The string is: SET STS_CFG=[d:][path](filename.ext) Note: Use all CAPITAL LETTERS. It is the user's responsibility to provide a valid drive and path specification. If you wish to place your config file in a different place but do not want to go through the setup procedure again, first copy your present config file to the place where you want it and then set the string to point at it. If you rename it, make sure the string contains the proper name. STS will use the SET= data if found, otherwise it will default to the current root and the default name. Example: If I wanted my config file to be located in a sub-directory I have named STEREO, I would add this string to my AUTOEXEC.BAT file. SET STS_CFG=C:\STEREO\STSCFG.CFG >> Note that I have included the complete drive, path, and filename. This is necessary! >> Sub Sec. 1.4.6 EXIT NO SAVE _____________________________________________________________________ (F7) or <Esc.> Exit NO save. This option will take you back to the StS main screen without saving the changes in the STSCFG.CFG file. This is useful for experimenting with colors or for temporary setup changes. 2-1 _____________________________________________________________________ >> PART 2 USING STEREO SHELL _____________________________________________________________________ >> Sec. 2.1 INTRODUCTION _____________________________________________________________________ Stereo Shell is a unique DOS shell utility program. This program provides two fully independent file/directory displays which enable it to provide extremely powerful, yet simple, file handling functions. The twin, or if you will, stereo display allows the user to perform file operations such as move and copy between any two drives, or directories, or combinations of drive/directories on the machine without ever typing a file or path name. Stereo Shell was also intended to be a fast, simple, and user friendly program to handle the otherwise tedious task of working with compressed files. StS takes a fresh approach to this task in that it uses a separate directory and split screen display to isolate and monitor the files associated with a compressed file. StS provides intelligent, easy to use menus for handling file and compressing functions. These menus are intelligent in that the menu that appears on the screen for the user is based on the filename extension of the file selected. For example, selecting a .ZIP file from the directory display will automatically open the file compressor operation window. The menu functions are of the "point-n-shoot" variety but also allow quick execution via the function keys. StS supports most of the standard file and compression commands through its menus and function keys. The following list is provided to give the user an idea of what StS will do. StS Functions Description Move file ........................ (from anywhere to anywhere) Copy file ........................ (from anywhere to anywhere) Rename file ...................... (standard DOS function) Erase file ....................... (standard DOS function) Erase read-only files ............ (asks to be sure, then zap) Tag files ........................ (tag/untag any or all files) Selectively tag files ............ (by name, date, archive bit etc.) Move tagged files ............... (very fast and smooth) Copy tagged files ............... (from anywhere to anywhere) Erase tagged files ............... (prompted super zap) Add tagged to library file ....... (build a compressed file) Convert tagged to another format . (block convert your library files) Execute user program on tagged ... (run any program repeatedly on tag) View file ........................ (built in dual mode viewer) View file ........................ (user defined optional ext. viewer) Edit file ........................ (user defined editor/Wp) 2-2 File attribute modify ............ (change dates times and attributes) User file function ............... (10 user defined utility programs) Launch applications .............. (10 launchable applications) Execute program .................. (.EXE, .COM, .BAT, .BTM files) Instant executable filter ........ (see only .EXE,.COM,.BAT, and .BTM) Quick find filename .............. (intelligent search within dir.) Change drive ..................... (with a single keystroke) Change drive ..................... (from DOS menu. Allows A-Z drives) Change alternate drive ........... (changes un-hooked side) Change alternate drive ........... (from DOS menu. Allows A-Z drives) Change directory ................. (fast, easy, sidebar technique) Directory tree ................... (display tree to change dirs.) Make directory ................... (from DOS command menu) Sort options ..................... (sort each window independently) Remove directory ................. (use <F10> or <Alt><F10>) File comment system .............. (4DOS(tm) compatible comment sys.) DOS command ...................... (run any DOS command from StS) DOS gateway ...................... (type EXIT to return) Supports .ZIP .ARC .LZH .PAK .ARJ formats -----| Create compression | Extract files |- Compression utility Test compression |- command support. View files in compression |- Works with up to 8 Verbose list compression contents. |- compression progs. Freshen files. | Update files. |- Tagged file support Delete files from compression. |- as well, see above. Convert from format to format ------| >> Sec. 2.2 THE StS DISPLAY _____________________________________________________________________ When StS is executed, the user is presented with a screen split into 3 main sections. There is a left file window that includes a sidebar labeled Chg. Dir., and a right file window that shows the contents of the working directory. Near the bottom of the screen is a title line with date/time display and also a function key guide. This section, explaining what the screen windows mean and do, is probably the most important section of the .DOC file. A complete understanding of the StS display and the stereo directory concept will make the remainder of the information presented here almost redundant. The split screen/dual directory display is the key to StS's simplicity and also what sets it apart from other DOS shell utility programs. We will start at the top of the display and examine each main area in detail. 2-3 >> Sub-Sec. 2.2.1 THE FILE WINDOWS ________________________________________________________________ Both file windows are dynamic. They are capable of display- ing the contents of any drive or directory on your machine. The ability to work with two fully functional displays at a time makes for an extremely powerful file manipulation and maintenance utility. The user can work "between" the displays when moving or copying files. This unique ability eliminates the necessity of ever typing in a path or filename. Please note; StS does allow you to type in paths and such for convenience, but unless a file is being renamed or created, it is possible to do all move and copy operations with only your mouse or cursor keypad. Information pertaining to the current file window display is presented at various points within the window. At the top center of each file window, actually on the border, StS displays a VOLUME = message. This will always show the disk drive to which the window is currently assigned. The drive:path at which the window is currently pointed is displayed in the top title area of the window. In the center or main section is the familiar filename-size-date display. An occasional hi-lighted block containing a lower-case s, r, or h may also appear just to the left of the date on some files. This indicates that the file has special attribute(s) assigned to it on the disk. r,s, and h refer to read-only, hidden, and system files respectively. In cases where the file has more than one of these attributes set only the most important will appear with the hierarchy being h, r, s. Also note that several filenames may also show a small dot to the immediate right of the file size. This dot indicates that the file archive bit is set. File attributes and their meanings are discussed later in this manual under the General File option command menu. The filename display will list the files present on disk in sorted order depending on the sort option chosen by the user. Sort types of file/ext, ext/file, date, size, and unsorted are supported and selected by pressing <F3> which opens a menu from which the sort type/criteria may be selected. The sort that has been defined for each window is saved when the setup is saved in setup mode. In the bottom title area the free disk space for the selected drive is shown. The sort type, file size, date, and attributes are shown on the bottom border areas. 2-4 >> Sub-Sec. 2.2.2 THE CHG. DIR. WINDOW ________________________________________________________________ In the center of the display is a narrow vertical window titled Chg.Dir. This window area is used to display sub-directory information and allow you to easily move around on the disk(s). A brief definition is in order here to explain a bit of Stereo Shell jargon:.... "Hooked" refers to the appearance of the directory window as it is graphically displayed on the screen. When the Chg.Dir. window is hooked to a file window, it appears to be connected to the file window and will form a continuous outer boundary. If the left and right file windows are in different colors, the Chg.Dir. window will assume the color of the file window to which it is hooked. The Chg.Dir. window always displays the sub-directories of the file window currently hooked. Pressing the left and right arrow keys or moving the mouse will allow the user to hook the Chg.Dir. window to either file window so long as there is file or directory information available to be read from that drive. StS logic prevents the user from placing the cursor in a completely blank window and thus will not allow a hook when a disk is completely blank and contains no sub-directories. The Chg.Dir. window, or directory sidebar window is a unique feature of StS and provides the user with the means to zip around on the disk. The change directory sidebar window displays, in sorted order, the sub-directories associated with the currently hooked file window. Separating the directories from the filename list and providing the user with a scrollable sorted listing, gives StS one of the fastest, easiest, and most convenient methods of changing directories available. By simply placing the "light bar" on the directory you want and pressing [ENTER], you can move anywhere on the disk. One feature of the directory display may not be familiar to some users and requires some explanation here. If you are displaying a sub-directory listing, you will notice that the first directory in the Chg. Dir. sidebar window appears as two dots (..). These two dots are the link to the parent of that sub-directory. Selecting the double dot directory will take you "up a notch" thus, this is the means to go backwards on the tree. This is the standard DOS method to do this job, not something that was created by the author. In fact many users will be delighted to know that this works from the DOS prompt. Anytime you are in a sub-directory, entering CD.. at the DOS prompt will cause you move up to the parent directory. 2-5 Stereo Shell also has the ability to display the tree style directory structure of a drive. This display is summoned by pressing the space bar, the insert key, or both mouse buttons while the light bar cursor is in the center window. The "classic" tree structure display, although not as fast and efficient as StS's native sidebar technique for changing directories, is useful for providing an overview of a drive layout. This feature is particularly nice when running the shell on a machine which is unfamiliar to the user. In the bottom title area of the Chg.Dir. window the total of all marked (tagged) files for the currently hooked directory is displayed. One quick trick worth mention here is the fact that the user can mark all files in the window and quickly find the total disk space occupied by the files. See the INS and DEL keys for the mark/un-mark all feature. >> Sub-Sec. 2.2.3 THE TITLE AND FUNCTION KEY AREA ________________________________________________________________ Across the bottom of the StS display the user finds a program title/version/copyright and date/time line. Below that is a function key guide. This is a standard function key help line and shows an abbreviated command for each F-key. Keys F8 and F10 may be used to rename and erase directories as well as files. DOS 3.xx+ is required to rename a directory. >> Sec. 2.3 StS DIRECT KEYS AND COMMANDS _____________________________________________________________________ This section will describe the direct key functions available to the StS user when file selection is in effect. >> Sub-Sec. 2.3.1 THE CURSOR AND SCREEN KEYS ________________________________________________________________ The cursor and screen keys provide the user with the means to select files and directories. Here we will list all the active keys in this group and detail what they do. > Left and Right arrow keys < The left and right arrow keys select the screen window. The selected window will contain a "light bar" cursor. The arrow keys wrap around between windows and all empty windows are skipped. > Up and Dn arrow keys < The up and down arrow keys allow the user to select a file or directory within a window. These keys move the cursor and also scroll the display when on the edge. The speaker will beep when the first and last entry in the window is reached. 2-6 > Home and End keys < The home and end keys will instantly scroll the selected window to the first and last entry in the window and place the light bar on it. > PgUp and PgDn < The page up and page down keys will instantly scroll the selected window display one page up or down. > The tab key. < The tab key will move the cursor between windows. >> Sub-Sec. 2.3.2 THE LETTER, NUMBER, AND MARKING KEYS ________________________________________________________________ The letter and number keys serve a very important role in the StS user interface. This section explains their use. > The letter keys; A,B,C,D, etc < The letter keys are used for a "QUICK FIND" scroll. Pressing a letter key will find a filename, extension, or directory beginning with the letter that is nearest to, without exceeding the letter that was pressed. This QUICK FIND is based on either the filename or extension depending on what the user has selected as the primary sort, ie. filename/ext or ext/file- name. QUICK FIND also has some built in intelligence. If all the files in a directory have extensions that begin with the same same letter, and you are sorting by extension, then the QUICK FIND automatically switches to a filename find. This switching allows users to set up directories containing files which are all of the same type and still be able to use QUICK FIND to advantage. QUICK FIND is disabled if you have selected any sort other than file/ext or ext/file. Pressing a letter key more than once will cause the cursor to go to the next file starting with that letter and so on until the last file is found. Pressing the same letter key twice on the last file will cause the cursor to again go to the first file and start back down the list. Valid keys for the QUICK FIND are A-Z. > The number keys; 1,2,3 etc. < The number keys allow the StS user to select the disk drive for display in the hooked window. Upon execution, StS requests drive information from DOS and assigns the number keys 1- 9 to access the correct drive letters. The keys are assigned as 1=A: 2=B: etc. If you press an unassigned number key StS will respond with a beep. 2-7 Pressing a number key will change the hooked window to the drive specified. The user can change the other side ( the un-hooked side ) by using <Alt> <1,2,3,etc.>. Users with more drives than are accessible with the number keys may select these drives from the DOS menu. > The <Alt> number keys; <Alt>1,2,3 etc. < The combination of <Alt> and the number keys 1,2,3, etc. will allow the user to change the un_hooked file window to another drive. This is a very important feature due to one of the idiosyncrasies of stereo windows. If you have a window pointed at say, a blank, formatted floppy disk, there is no way to hook to that window because it is totally blank. Pressing <Alt> 1,2,3 will allow the user to change the drive of that window without ever hooking to it. A good way to remember this command is to always think of the un-hooked window as the alternate window and hence <Alt> key controlled. Users with more drives than are accessible with the number keys may select these drives from the DOS menu. > The space bar. < The space bar will mark or unmark (tag) a file for subsequent copy or erase activity. The marked file is indicated by a small diamond displayed at the end of the filename extension. The space bar also serves a function in the Chg. dir. window. If pressed while the cursor is in the Chg. dir. window StS will display a tree structure of the drive. > The Ins. and Del. keys. < The insert and delete keys will instantly mark or un-mark all files in a directory window. The Ins. & Del. keys also serve a function in the Chg. dir. window. If pressed while the cursor is in the Chg. dir. window StS will display a tree structure of the drive. > The backspace and asterisk keys < (executable file filter) The backspace or asterisk key will instantly filter out all the "trash" files in a sub-directory and leave the display showing only the executable files with extensions of .EXE, .COM, .BAT, and .BTM. This is useful for quickly locating programs to run and eliminating the data files. This is a toggle function, push the key to again show all files. 2-8 > The [Alt] [C] key. < (4DOS(tm) file comment system) This key pair will display any existing file comment which may then be edited by the user. If no file comment exists, a comment may be created and saved via this entry system. Stereo Shell maintains the file comments in a normally hidden file named DESCRIPT.ION in the same sub-dir. as the files being commented. File descriptions are moved, copied, renamed, deleted, etc. as the operations are carried out on the files themselves. The Stereo Shell file comment system is 100% 4DOS (tm) compatible and has been implemented with the permission of JP Software the creators of 4DOS. 4DOS is not required to use the StS file comment system. > The [Alt] [D] key. < (DOS command/gateway) This key pair will open a dialogue window which will allow the user to either execute a DOS command directly or to "gateway" to DOS. Entering nothing on the command line will open the gateway. The drive/directory that will be considered "current" by DOS when the command is issued is displayed in the window. > The [Alt] [E] key. < (enhanced display) This key pair will switch the StS display resolution on MCGA, EGA, or VGA equipped systems. Three modes are sup- ported on the MCGA and VGA, two are available on the EGA. > The [Alt] [H] key. < (help) This key pair will load the user defined StS help file and display it with the viewer. The location and name of the help file may be defined in the StS setup. > The [Alt] [Q] key. < (quit) This key pair is the fastest way to exit from StS. When pressed, this key combination will return the user to DOS and restore the drive/directory that was current when StS was executed. > The [Alt] [R] key. < (reset) This key pair will reset the right side to the work dir. > The [Alt] [S] key. < (setup) This key pair will run StS's integrated external setup program. The setup program must reside somewhere in the DOS path and its name must match the version of StS. For example the setup program for StS version 4.10 would be STSET410.EXE 2-9 > The [Alt] [T] key. < (time check) This key combination will toggle the hooked window display mode between size/date and date/time mode. The window mode for each window can be saved by saving the setup with the windows set as desired. >> Sub-Sec. 2.3.3 THE COMMAND KEYS ________________________________________________________________ The command keys open an StS menu. This section outlines the use of the command keys. > The Enter key < The carriage return or enter key is used to select a file or directory. In the case of a directory selection, StS will immediately change and display the new directory in the hooked window, and any associated sub-directories in the Chg. Dir. sidebar area. In the case of a file selection, StS will open the appropriate menu to work with that file based on the filename extension. A .ZIP or .ARC file opens the compression menu. A .EXE .COM or .BAT file opens the EXE COM BAT window. And the selection of any other file extension opens the GENERAL file menu. > [F1], [+], or [Esc] keys < Pressing the F1, +, or Esc. keys opens the DOS menu. The DOS window is described in detail in the following sections, but for now, this is how it is accessed. It was decided to use so many keys to do this job for several reasons. F1 and Esc. are the keys most users instinctively think of as the method to escape from, or get help in using, a program. So, they were both used here. F1 has the added nicety of being the first command in the DOS window, namely, EXIT to DOS. By pressing F1 repeatedly the user can quickly exit from StS. The plus key was chosen for its location. Since most keyboards have a large plus key located near the numeric keypad (cursor control) area, using the plus key as a substitute for Esc. allows one handed operation of StS. The plus key works as a replacement for Esc. everywhere in StS except when the program is prompting for a filename. Since the user has full cursor control, an ENTER key, and a plus key, all located in one bundle on the standard keyboard, the user can almost operate StS with just one hand. 2-10 > The other active function keys < Several other function keys are active when StS is in file selection mode. Here is a description of their functions. [F2] Function key F2 calls either the marked file option menu or a marking criteria menu depending on whether there were files marked when F2 was pressed. The marking criteria menu will allow the user to define how files in the window are to be marked. This menu is discussed in more detail later in this document. The marked file option menu will allow the user to to move, copy, erase, etc. files that have been tagged. [F3] Function key F3 will open a menu of possible sort types from which the user may select. Upon selection of a sort type the file window is re-sorted and displayed. [F4] Function key F4 will immediately open the user defined file utility menu which will allow you to select a pre-defined utility program to run. Please see part 1 for information on defining these utilities. [F5] Function key F5 will immediately execute the user defined edit utility program, passing to it, the filename beneath the cursor. Please see part 1 for information on defining this utility. [F6] Function key F6 will immediately execute the internal view utility program. The Stereo Shell view utility will analyze the filename extension and appear either in HEX mode or ASCII mode. Pressing the space bar will switch modes. Please see the later section on StS view. [F7] Function key F7 will allow the user to move a file to any other directory. When F7 is pressed, the lower screen will be overlaid with a dialogue box requesting that the user enter a new path filename to move to. The currently selected file will be displayed in the top left corner of the box window. If only a path is specified, the file will be moved to the new location using the same name. If a new name is specified, the file will be moved and renamed in one operation. * * * As a special feature of StS, if nothing is specified, and the user simply presses ENTER, the file is moved between the currently displayed windows. If the user is in the left window the file will be moved to the right window and vice-versa. Pressing Esc. while being prompted for input will cancel the operation. 2-11 [F8] Function key F8 will allow the user to rename a file. When F8 is pressed, the lower screen will be overlaid with a dialogue box requesting the new filename. The currently selected file will be displayed in the top left corner of the box window. * * * F8 also serves as a move file command. If a valid path is entered without a filename then the file is simply moved to the new location. If a path and filename are entered, the file is both moved and renamed in one operation! If only the filename is given, the file is simply renamed. Pressing Esc. while being prompted for input will cancel the operation. F8 can also be used to rename directories if using DOS 3.00+. [F9] Function key F9 will allow the user to copy a file to any drive or directory. When F9 is pressed, the lower screen will be overlaid with a dialogue box requesting that the user enter a new [d:] [path] [filename.ext]. The current- ly selected file will be displayed in the top left corner of the box window. If only a drive or path is specified the file will be copied to the new location under the same name. If a new name is specified, the copy of the file will use the specified name. * * * As a special feature of StS, if nothing is specified, and the user simply presses ENTER, the file is copied between the currently displayed windows. If the user is in the left window the file will be copied to the right window and vice-versa. Pressing Esc. while being prompted for input will cancel the operation. [F10] Function key F10 is the erase file command. This key prompts for confirmation of the erase. Please see the next function for a more efficient way to erase files. [Alt] [F10] The key combination of Alt. F10 will erase the file or directory under the cursor! In the case of a file the operation simply "zaps" the file. If this key is used to delete a directory entry, the directory must be empty or StS will report the error and the directory will not be removed. Please note that a two key combination was used for this function to prevent accidental erasure of files. >> Sub-Sec. 2.3.4 MOUSE CONTROL ________________________________________________________________ Stereo Shell includes a built in mouse interface. To use your mouse, a Microsoft compatible mouse driver is all that is required. See your mouse documentation for information on how to load the mouse driver. 2-12 The StS mouse interface emulates various keyboard keys to provide user control. The key emulations are outlined below. Left button:...... Same as <CR> key. Right button:..... Same as <Esc> key. Both buttons:..... Same as <Space bar>. Hold to repeat. Roll away:........ Same as <Up arrow> key. Roll toward:...... Same as <Dn arrow> key. Roll left:........ Same as <Lt arrow> key. Roll right:....... Same as <Rt arrow> key. >> Sub-Sec. 2.3.5 FILENAME CONVENTIONS ________________________________________________________________ StS uses standard DOS filename conventions when prompting for input. Items displayed in square brackets are optional while those displayed in parenthesis are required. All drive letters must be followed by a colon and all path names must end in either a slash or backslash. For more information on standard DOS conventions, see the DOS manual. >> Sec. 2.4 THE DOS MENU _____________________________________________________________________ The DOS window provides the StS user with the ability to perform some basic program functions such as opening the DOS gateway and exiting StS. This window is opened by pressing either <Esc> or <+> or <F1>. This section will take the functions available in the DOS window and explain them in the order they appear. [F1] QUIT and return to DOS. This option will end StS. Through this method, the user may exit back to the original load drive\directory or exit into either displayed window. See also <Alt><Q> for a faster exit method. [F2] ERASE working dir. files. This option provides a fast and neat method to erase the contents of the working directory. When selected, the files in the working directory will be erased. [F3] DOS gateway/command. This option opens a dialogue window which will allow the user to either execute a DOS command directly or to "gateway" to DOS. Entering nothing on the command line will open the gateway. The drive/directory that will be considered "current" by DOS when the command is issued is displayed in the window. 2-13 [F4] CREATE a compressed file. This option will allow the user to create a totally new compressed file. The user will first be asked to select a type and then the program will prompt for the filename. StS will then execute the utility and pass the create command to it. All files that are currently in the work dir. will be included in the new compression or added to any existing compression that has the name specified by the user. The new file will be created in the currently hooked window. Pressing Esc. while being prompted for the file type or filename will cancel the operation. * This command invokes a sub-menu that allows I/O re-direction. Please see section 2.8.1 for information concerning this menu. [F5] MAKE a new sub-directory This option will allow the user to make a new sub-directory on the disk. The user will be prompted for the path and directory name. Pressing Esc. while being prompted for the name will cancel the operation. [F6] MARKED file operations. This command will open the marked file operations window allowing the user to do marked operations. Please see the marked file menu section later in this manual. [F7] DRIVE chg. (hooked side) This option allows the user to change the disk drive to which the hooked window is assigned. Users with more logical disk drives than are addressable via the number key method may use options F7 and F8 to reach them. StS internally bit-maps all valid disk drives and will only display valid letters. Mouse users can select drives by moving the mouse vertically and clicking the left button on the drive letter. [F8] DRIVE chg. (un-hooked). This option is identical to option F7 above except that it allows selection of the un-hooked window. [F9] SETUP (tune Stereo Shell) Will run the internal setup program. The use of the setup program is explained in part 1. >> Sec. 2.5 THE GENERAL FILE MENU _____________________________________________________________________ The general file menu is opened when the user selects a file that does not have an extension of EXE, COM, BAT, ARC, ZIP, etc. This section describes the options available via this window. 2-14 [F1] VIEW the selected file. This option will run the internal dual mode view utility. The View utility will begin in either ASCII or Hex mode depending on the file type selected. Pressing the space bar will switch modes. The full cursor pad or the mouse may be used to control the viewer. [F2] EDIT the selected file. This option will execute the user defined external editor or word processor program and pass the filename to it. Please see part 1 for setup information. [F3] USER defined file utility. This function will immediately open the user defined file utility menu which will allow you to select a pre-defined utility program to run. Please see part 1 for information on defining these utilities. [F4] COPY the selected file. This function will allow the user to copy a file to any drive or directory. When this function is used, the lower screen will be overlaid with a dialogue box requesting that the user enter a new [d:] [path] [filename.ext]. The currently selected file will be displayed in the top left corner of the window. If only a drive or path is specified the file will be copied to the new location under the same name. If a new name is specified, the copy of the file will use the specified name. * * * As a special feature of StS, if nothing is specified, and the user simply presses ENTER, the file is copied between the currently displayed windows. If the user is in the left window the file will be copied to the right window and vice-versa. Pressing Esc. while being prompted for the filename will cancel the operation. [F5] RENAME the selected file. This function will allow the user to rename a file. When this function is selected, the lower screen will be overlaid with a dialogue box requesting the new filename. The currently selected file will be displayed in the top left corner of the window. * * * This function also serves as a move file command. If a valid path is entered without a filename then the file is simply moved to the new location. If a path and filename are entered, the file is both moved and renamed in one operation! If only the filename is given, the file is simply renamed. Pressing Esc. while being prompted for input will cancel the operation. [F6] MOVE the selected file. This function will allow the user to move a file. When this function is selected, the lower screen will be overlaid with a dialogue box requesting the new pathname. The currently selected file will be displayed in the top left corner of the window. * This function is a variation of the rename command tailored specifically for moving files. If the source and destination paths are on different drives, the program will automatically switch to a copy/delete sequence to accomplish the move operation. The move command takes advantage of the stereo aspects of StS by allowing the user to move files between windows. 2-15 [F7] ERASE the selected file. The currently selected filename appears in the top left corner of the window. Selecting this option will erase the file. Warning: The user is not queried for a confirmation on the erase single file commands. Pressing this key WILL erase the file. It was felt that since this was a menu driven function and the key was well defined, that a confirmation request on the single file function would be a burden to the user. In keeping with recognized DOS methods, the multiple file erase commands do prompt for a Y/N confirmation but the single file erase commands do not. [F8] ATTRIBUTE/date editor. Selecting this option will open another menu which displays the current file attributes, date and time and allows the user to change them. To change any of the file attributes, simply press the appropriate function key. <F1-F4> The attrib- ute will be toggled off/on. Selecting <F5> will allow the user to change the file's date and time. When <F5> is pressed the cursor will appear on the displayed date. At this point, three things can be done; (1.) Press <Esc> to exit with no change. (2.) Press <Enter> to automatically insert the current date/ time. (3.) Type in the complete date/time values. All fields must be entered by the user. Four file attributes (bits) are defined by DOS to classify files on your disk. The archive, system, hidden, and read only bits may be controlled with this option. What follows is a brief description of normal bit settings. Archive: This bit is set ON by most programs that are capable of changing a file. (text editors for example) It is turned off by most backup programs whenever the file is backed up. (hence changed/archived) System: This bit is normally set ON only on files that relate to the operating system proper. Files such as MSDOS.SYS will have this bit set. Hidden: If this bit is set ON the filename will be excluded from normal directory searches by MS-DOS. StS can still "see" the file if the hidden option is < ON> in the setup program. Read only: This is probably the most useful attribute from the standpoint of the user. If this bit is set ON the file cannot be modified or erased by any normal means. StS has the ability to erase read-only files but will prompt the user for confirmation before doing so. Examples: Standard file entry: A s h r Standard r/only file: A s h R Hidden file entry: A s H R Hidden system file: A S H R 2-16 [F9] LAUNCH .xxx application. This option only appears when a file with an extension that matches an extension defined for a launchable application has been selected by the user. Selecting this option will launch the application and pass it the filename on the command line. Please see the setup program (Part 1) for more information on setting up launchable applications. >> Sec. 2.6 MARKED FILES MENUS _____________________________________________________________________ There are two menus associated with file marking and marked files operations. These menus will be discussed in each of the following subsections. >> Sub Sec. 2.6.1 THE MARKING CRITERIA MENU __________________________________________________________________ The marking criteria menu allows the user to define a "mask" or "filter" to direct StS as to which files to mark. This menu appears only if and when the F2 function key is pressed and there are no files marked in the hooked window. If there are existing file marks when F2 is pressed, the marked files menu (discussed later) will appear instead. In this section, the operation of the marking criteria menu will be explained. [F1] Mark files as defined. This option instructs StS to mark the files according to the defined criteria and transfers control to the marked files menu. [F2] Filespec = ????????.??? This option allows the user to define a filespec to be used in the filter. For example, if only files with the name HELP are desired to be marked, then HELP.* or HELP.??? would be the mask defined. The filespec defined here may use DOS wildcard characters and follows DOS rules for definitions. [F3] Before. ≤ xx-xx-xx xx:xx This option allows the user to define the ending file date/time to mark files. All files that have a d/t less than or equal to this d/t AND greater than or equal to the d/t defined in the F4 option below will be eligible for marking pending whatever other criteria are set. The default d/t for this option is the current date/time as read from the system which would normally be greater than or equal to the date/time of all files. 2-17 [F4] After.. ≥ xx-xx-xx xx:xx This option allows the user to define the starting file date/time to mark files. All files that have a d/t greater than or equal to this d/t AND less than or equal to the d/t defined in the F3 option above will be eligible for marking pending whatever other criteria are set. The default d/t for this option is 01-01-80 00:00 which precedes the IBM-PC and would normally be less than or equal to the date/time of all files. [F5] Smaller ≤ 99999999 bytes This option allows the user to define the largest size of files to mark. Files that are smaller than or equal to the size defined here AND are larger than or equal to the size defined in F6 below will be eligible for marking pending whatever other criteria are set. The default is 99999999 bytes which should normally include all files. [F6] Larger. ≥ 00 bytes This option allows the user to define the smallest size of files to mark. Files that are larger than or equal to the size defined here AND are smaller than or equal to the size defined in F5 above will be eligible for marking pending whatever other criteria are set. The default is 00 bytes which should normally include all files. [F7] Modified: * (archive bit) This option allows files to be selected for marking based on the status of the archive bit of the file attribute. The archive bit is set whenever a file is edited or changed by an application program. The archive bit is cleared when a file is backed-up by a backup program or manually cleared by a capable program like Stereo Shell. This option is useful for selecting only files that have changed since a backup was made. The default setting for this option is * which means "don't care" and makes all files eligible for marking. [F8] Inverted: N This option reverses the marking criteria. Normally the StS marking criteria can be considered "inclusive". Setting the F8 option to Y makes it "exclusive". This is best demonstrated by example; Assume the F5 and F6 size options above are set to mark files between 1200 and 14000 bytes. If the inverted option is set, all files EXCEPT those that are between 1200 and 14000 bytes will be marked. In other words files that fall within the defined criteria are excluded. [F9] Restore default criteria. Once a file marking criteria is set by the user, it remains set. This feature allows one to change drives and or sub-directories and mark files in each area with the same defined criteria. This eliminates the need to re-define the criteria with each use of the menu. The F9 "restore" option provides a quick and easy means to restore the defaults with one keystroke. 2-18 >> Sub Sec. 2.6.2 THE MARKED FILES MENU __________________________________________________________________ The marked files menu allows the user to copy, move, erase, view edit, perform user defined file functions, change the attributes and dates and also perform compressed file operations on "marked" or "tagged" files. Since these first six functions are virtually identical to their individual file counterparts, the reader is referred to the previous section for details. Option (F7), (F8), and (F9) however deserve some explanation. [F7] ATTRIBUTE/date editor. The attribute date editor's application for marked files differs slightly from its single file equivalent. When this option is selected, the attributes displayed do not reflect the attributes of any of the marked files. The initial con- dition for the attributes is all OFF. You may toggle any of the attributes any way you like, and saving the settings will set ALL the marked files to your defined attributes. Likewise the initial date/time fields are filled with asterisks. If you do not enter a new date/time, the dates and times of the marked files will not be changed. If you do enter a date and time, then ALL the marked files will be set to this date and time. [F8] CONVERT library types. This option provides the means to block convert library files from one type to another. Library files of any type may be marked and converted to the same format. For example you could mark .LZH, .ARC, and .PAK files and convert them all to .ZIP format in one pass. Files marked that are not of a defined extension type are simply ignored by the command. When selected, you will be asked to define the type of file to convert to. Once the type is selected the program will automatically load the proper programs to extract and re-com- ress each of the marked files. As with any other marked file operation, pressing the <Esc> key will terminate the automatic process. Please see the FILE COMPRESSOR MENU section for more in- formation about file conversion and error handling. [F9] ADD/CREATE to a library. This option will allow the user to pick out files from a directory and either add them to a library or create a new library file with them included. When this option is selected it may scare you a little. It first performs an automatic copy of the selected files to a temporary sub-directory. This is done so that the files may be isolated from the others and the wildcard *.* can be used to control the compression program. Once the auto-copy is completed the user will be prompted to select a library type and a library file name. This option will either add or create the library file depending on whether it previously existed. 2-19 Marked file operation with stereo windows is an extremely powerful feature. It provides the user with the means to move large numbers of files around quickly, without the drudgery of typing in pathnames. By simply pointing the two windows at the source and destination of your operation and accepting the default "across display", you can get the job done quickly and see what is going on during the process. >> Sec. 2.7 THE EXE COM BAT MENU _____________________________________________________________________ The EXE COM BAT file menu is opened when the user selects a file that has an extension of EXE, COM, or BAT. This section describes the options available via this window. [F1] EXECUTE the selected file. This option will execute the selected file which is displayed in the lower left corner of the window. When selected this option prompts for additional parameters to pass to the program. These parameters are what the user would normally enter on the DOS command line after the filename. For example: If the user wanted to run DEBUG and pass the filename TEST.EXE to it, he would place the cursor on DEBUG and press <CR>, StS would open the EXE COM BAT window and from there the user selects [F1]. The response to the parameter entry window would be; TEST.EXE. StS is capable of executing .EXE .COM and .BAT files via the [F1] function, but note the process for .EXE and .COM files differs from .BAT files because a duplicate copy of COMMAND.COM is needed for .BAT files. Although this process is transparent to the user, the author of this program likes to know what is going on behind the scenes and thinks most users do too. When a file is executed, StS shrinks its total memory usage to 50Kb to allow the maximum memory for the application's use. In the case of .BAT files, the command processor is loaded and takes a block of RAM depending on the MS-DOS version used. What this means in reality is that you can run larger programs directly from StS than you can if the program is run via a batch file executed from StS. *--------> NEVER run a terminate and stay resident (TSR) program from StS or any other DOS shell. When this type of program is executed it makes a permanent place for itself at the memory address it was loaded. Since the program is loaded above the DOS shell, it will permanently cut out a large chunk of usable memory. [F2] - [F9] VIEW, EDIT, USER, COPY, RENAME, MOVE, ERASE, CHG. ATTR. The F2-F8 options are identical in operation to the general files menu options described above. 2-20 >> Sec. 2.8 THE FILE COMPRESSOR MENU _____________________________________________________________________ Selecting a file with a ZIP, ARC, LZH, PAK, or ARJ, (defaults) extension will open the file compressor menu. This section will describe the options available from this menu and give the equivalent PK commands. NOTE: In this section the default name ZDIR, is used for the working dir. StS handles library (compressed) file procedures by using the sub-directory ZDIR as an isolated work area. All files are extracted into ZDIR and all freshen/update/create activity uses ZDIR as the source of files. This concept makes StS extremely useful for working with compressed files. It is possible to keep large programs compressed, extract to ZDIR, execute from ZDIR, freshen or update and then erase the individual files without disturbing anything else on the disk. This approach, when combined with with the powerful copy and move features of Stereo, makes file compression a logical alternative to bigger disk drives. ZDIR should never be used as a "storage" place for miscellaneous files. Note: References to actual commands in the descriptions that follow are based on PKZIP. These are provided only for illustrative purposes and may vary with different compression utilities. [F1] EXTRACT files. This option uses the -e command to extract files from the selected library. The user is prompted for filenames so that a partial or "wildcard" extract can be performed. If nothing is entered in response to the filename prompt, all files will be extracted. The extracted files are placed in the ZDIR directory unless the user redirects the output. Pressing Esc. while being prompted for the filename(s) will cancel the operation. (I/O redirection. see next section) [F2] LIST filenames to screen. This option uses the -v command to provide the user with a listing of the library's contents. Filenames, file sizes, and other related technical information is provided to the user. This option is useful to determine the contents of a library before selective extracting or deletion is performed. [F3] TYPE text files on screen. This option uses the -cm command to extract files directly to the video display. On the later versions of PKUNZIP the more command is added and prompts the user after each screen full of information is given. This option provides the user with the means to quickly view text files without the need to extract them. 2-21 [F4] TEST compress integrity. This option uses the -t command to test the validity of the library and the files within it. This command should be particularly useful to BBS sysops and program librarians who need to perform a quick test of their library files. [F5] DELETE files from library. This uses the -d command to delete files from the selected library. The user will be prompted for the file- name(s) to delete. The user must enter a filename or press Esc to cancel the operation. To determine the filenames present in any given library use the [F2] (verbose list) command from this menu first. [F6] FRESHEN library file. This option uses the -f command to freshen the files in the library. In the case of PKZIP, the actual command string is -f -ex which provides extra compression on binary files. Freshen differs from update in that new files are not added to the library file. Freshen only updates files that already exist in the library and have been changes since the library originally created. (I/O redirection. see next section) [F7] UPDATE + add to library. This option uses the -u command to update the files in the library. In the case of PKZIP, the actual command string is -u -ex which provides extra compression on binary files. Update differs from freshen in that new files ARE added to the library file. Update not only updates files that already exist in the library and have been changes since the library originally created, it also ADDS any new files that are present in ZDIR or in the user specified override directory. (I/O redirection. see next section) * * * * * NOTES AND HINTS ABOUT FRESHEN/UPDATE. ... Freshening * means that only files that have filenames matching those files * already in the library will be considered in the update * process. This option should be used if the extracted files * are changed by some activity performed on them. For example: * If you un-arc a spreadsheet file and make a few changes, then * the original library should be freshened so that the changes * will be reflected the next time the file is used. As * another example: If a new spreadsheet file is created in the * ZDIR then you should update and add to insure that the new * file is stored within the library. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 2-22 [F8] CONVERT compress format. This option will automatically convert compressed files from format to format. The user will be asked to select the type of format that the file will be converted into. A sub directory named Z_STS_TD is created on the working drive and is used as a temporary holding area for the extracted files. The filename extension is changed as well as the file format. Example: TEST.ARC converted to LZH format becomes TEST.LZH. * * * * * CONVERSION UTILITY NOTES ... The process of library * file conversion merits some deeper explanation into the actual * procedure that is going on behind the scenes. This is necessary * due to the possibility of the program failures that can occur * during the process. A good understanding of the StS file con- * version method will allow you to easily locate and recover your * data in the event of a failure. * * The conversion process: * * (1.) Files are extracted to a temporary sub-directory that StS * creates on the working drive. (see the setup program for * information about the working drive) The sub-directory is * named \Z_STS_TD. If a failure occurs in this step the * conversion process will be terminated and the original * library file will still be intact. In some cases there * may be files in \Z_STS_TD that will need to be erased * before any other files may be converted. * * (2.) If step 1 is successful, the original library file is * erased at this point. This is done to allow the conversion * of files to be performed on floppy disk drives. Quite * often disk space will not permit both the old and new * library files to exist simultaneously. It is worth noting * here that the user can prevent step 2 from occurring by * giving the library file a read only attribute mark before * doing the conversion. Please see the change attribute * options for information on how to do this. * * (3.) The files that were extracted to \Z_STS_TD are now added * to a new library file that assumes the same filename as * the original. If a failure occurs in this step the * conversion process is terminated and the user may recover * his original files from the \Z_STS_TD sub-directory. * * (4.) If step 3 is successful the extracted files are erased and * temporary sub-directory \Z_STS_TD is removed. The * original date/time and file attributes are passed on to the * new library file. * --------------------------------------------------- * We have designed the file conversion process to be as safe * as possible in order to prevent the loss of data during a * conversion. It is hoped that the descriptions above will help * you recover your files in the event that something like an ill * defined utility path causes a runtime crash. It is wise to test * your utility programs on single files to be sure that they are * working properly before using the convert. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * 2-23 [F9] GENERAL FILES MENU. This command will open the General files menu allowing you to move/copy/erase etc. a library file. See General files menu section for more details. >> Sub Sec. 2.8.1 THE I/O RE-DIRECTION SUB MENU __________________________________________________________________ Several of the file compression commands invoke a sub-menu which allows the user to specify where to send files that are extracted from library files or where to look for files that are intended to add, freshen, or update a library file. Hence the file input or output of the compressed file operation may be controlled by the user. The following is a brief description of the options available on this sub-menu. [F1] WORKing directory. This option will send\receive files to/from the working directory. (ZDIR) [F2] ACROSS display. This option will send\receive files to/from the un-hooked window. This is similar to the copy across dis- play feature of Stereo. [F3] HERE no re-direction. This option will send\receive files to/from the hooked window. [F4] USER defined path. This option will prompt the user for the I/O path to use. >> Sub Sec. 2.8.2 THE EXTENDED ZIP MENU __________________________________________________________________ The "EZ" interface is offered to users whenever a .ZIP file is selected and either an extract, view text files, or delete, command is issued. If the EZ interface is opted for, the menu window will expand and a directory of the .ZIP file will be displayed. In the interest of memory preservation and speed, only the filename and extension data is provided. The files are sorted by StS and the sort is either name/ext or ext/name. The sort of the ZIP directory listing takes on the same sort as the hooked window if the hooked window was one of these two types else it uses whatever sort it used the last time it was opened. The ZIP directory menu filename list is controlled in a manner identical to to the main screen file windows. Full cursor pad and mouse support as well as the quick find letter keys are supported. Files may be marked with the space bar or both mouse buttons. All files may be marked or unmarked with the insert and delete keys. 2-24 IF NO FILES ARE MARKED: Pressing the ENTER key will cause only the file the cursor is on to be processed. IF FILES ARE MARKED:... Pressing the ENTER key will cause the marked files to be processed. The filename that the cursor bar is on will be ignored unless it is marked. Pressing ESCAPE will exit with no action. The "EZ" interface attempts to read the contents of the central directory of the selected .ZIP file directly. It opens the file and reads the filename information directly from the file PKZIP is not involved in this process. The program is compatible with PKZIP version 1.00 and later, some older versions such as .91 are not supported. If a file zipped with an older version of PKZIP is encountered, it may easily be converted to the newer version with StS. If Stereo Shell cannot read the .ZIP directory directly, it automatically switches to the standard interface. An error is reported in the menu window when this occurs but the program continues on as if the user had selected the default standard interface. If an unrecoverable error occurs while the actual zip directory menu is displayed, StS will abort the whole process just as if the Escape key had been pressed. An error of this type might occur when a re-sort is attempted if say the file is on a floppy and the disk has been changed. In a rare case like this, there is nothing more StS (or PKZIP) can do, so the abort is appropriate. The EZ interface does not support the extremely rare case of ZIP files whose central directory structure spans multiple disk media. It will switch to the standard interface and let PKZIP handle it. The EZ interface has limited support for .ZIP files with relative path names stored inside. These are .ZIP files created with the the -r option that are generally used for system backup purposes. The EZ interface will show the filenames, however PKUNZIP will be unable to extract the files unless the -d option is specified under the extract command. If -d is specified, then the relative paths will be created on extraction... It is better to use the standard interface which will override the path information entirely and extract all the files to wherever they have been I/O re-directed. This type of .ZIP file is rarely encountered in normal operations. We DO NOT recommend the -d option be used for extractions in StS. This situation is better handled with dedicated batch files for backing up and restoring hard disk information. The EZ interface has a maximum capacity of 1050 files within the .ZIP file. If a .ZIP file contains more than 1050 files, only the first 1050 filenames encountered will be displayed. 2-25 The EZ interface creates and destroys a file named STS_PKZP.LST on the working drive as the list file to pass the filename list information to PKZIP. This filename should be considered reserved. >> Sec. 2.9 THE INTERNAL VIEW UTILITY _____________________________________________________________________ Stereo Shell includes an internal dual mode view utility that will allow viewing of ASCII or binary files. The view utility determines from the filename extension what type of file is selected and automatically comes up in the correct mode. ie. either ASCII or HEX. The StS view utility was designed to be used as a "quick look" tool and not a full blown do everything viewer. Although simple, the viewer is quite fast and provides full screen viewing with mouse support. It includes a non-case-sensitive string search routine that is based on the ultra efficient Boyer-Moore algorithm as well as printing capabilities in both hex and ASCII modes. Many users of StS choose to retain the StS internal viewer as the primary viewer and attach a more sophisticated viewer program like Buerg's LIST.COM to one of the user keys to do the heavy work. This section notes the key commands used in view and also makes note of the special mouse control. >> KEYBOARD CONTROL > Up/Dn arrows ............ Scroll 1 line up and down > Lt/Rt arrows ............ Scroll 1 page up and down > PgUp and PgDn ........... Scroll 1 page up and down > Home and End ........... Top or End of file > Enter key ............... Scroll one page down > Space bar ............... Search for string > [F1] key ................ Switch HEX/ASCII mode > Esc. or + key ........... Exit view mode >> MOUSE CONTROL > roll up and down ........ Scroll 1 line up and down > roll rt. and lt. ........ Scroll 1 page up and down > left button ............. Scroll one page down > right button ............ Exit view mode > both buttons ............ Switch HEX/ASCII mode >> PRINTER CONTROL KEYS > F2 key:.........=> Print from top of screen until a key is pressed. > F3 key:.........=> Send a form feed (ASCII 12) to the printer. 2-26 >> Sec. 2.10 USEFUL NOTES AND HINTS _____________________________________________________________________ This section contains some notes and hints for using Stereo Shell. Using the menus: StS includes what we call quadraphonic menus. This means that the user may enter a command in any of four ways. (1.) Point and shoot with the cursor keys. (2.) Point and shoot with the mouse. (3.) Type the corresponding function key. (4.) Type the letter that appears the the left of the command. The letters are generated automatically on user defined functions and generally are the first letter of the user defined text string. If the first letter has already been used, the second letter is used and so on. Printing files: A text file may be sent to the standard printer by copying it to PRN. To do this, place the cursor on the file and issue a copy command. When StS prompts for the destination, enter PRN. Do not include a colon after the device name. StS may report a "file exists overwrite" message on some systems, if it does, tell it yes. Upon completion of the print, StS may report that the file was not copied, but of course if the printer printed it, it was. The error messages are a result of the checking StS does when copying files between disk drives. Since the PRN device does not behave like a disk drive, it causes StS to report the errors. Stereo Shell's internal viewer may also be used to print files and of course the user can load a file into an editor or external viewer and print it from there. Floppy disks: Although both of Stereo's windows will allow the user to perform all the same functions, use of the right window for floppy disk access will provide slightly better performance. The reasons for this are complicated but have to do with the fact that DOS only has one true default directory active at any time. When Stereo is running, the left window always displays the true default directory. If the left window remains pointed at a hard disk, whose directory information is buffered in RAM by DOS, the need to read the physical disk when changing directories is minimized. If the left window points at a floppy, StS will re-read it more often when the user changes directories on either side. A-1 APPENDIX A COMPRESSION UTILITIES INTERFACING _____________________________________________________________________ The compressor interface of StS is built upon the speed and power of up to 8 different compression utility programs. This appendix is provided as a guide for modifying the commands StS passes to these utilities in order to perform the various file compression functions. If you plan to modify your file compression interface be warned that StS allows very powerful control and you can change the entire personality of the program. You will need a copy of the user manual that comes with your file compression utility before proceeding. To set the various file compression commands you must go into setup mode (ALT-S) and then select (F4) Files/external setup. Next you may select any one of up to eight file compression utilities to re-program. Selecting these options will open a screen that shows the current settings for each supported command. Simply select a command and use the built in line editor to change the string. The string may be up to 16 bytes in length. The Extension key may be somewhat un-familiar and will be discussed here. The other options and the program that executes their respective commands is outlined in table 1 below. The Extension key defines the filename extension that will trigger Stereo Shell into opening the file compressor window. Some examples are ARC, PAK, ZIP, etc. If you decide to change this option, just enter the three letters, no need to place a period before them. The entire program menu system will be updated to reflect your change. For example, if you set the EXTENSION trigger to ZAP, the COMPRESSION TYPE WINDOW will then have an option that says "(F ) ZAP - File compression options. --------- A-2 >> Table 1 << Compression command chart. ____________________________________________________________________ EXECUTED BY THE PACKER| Un-PACKER Command ----------------- Description EXTRACT files | | X | Extracts files from the library file. --------------------------------------------------------------------- TYPE text files | | X | Allows reading text files on screen. --------------------------------------------------------------------- DELETE files | X | | Removes files from within the library. --------------------------------------------------------------------- LIST all files | X | | Provides a directory of files in lib. --------------------------------------------------------------------- TEST integrity | | X | Checks the library file for errors. --------------------------------------------------------------------- FRESHEN no add | X | | Freshens files that have been changed. --------------------------------------------------------------------- UPDATE and add | X | | Freshens old files and adds new files. --------------------------------------------------------------------- CREATE new file | X | | Creates a totally new library file. In this table, PACKER and Un-PACKER refer to the programs you have defined earlier. For example the default ZIP packer is PKZIP. For information about programming these SUFFIX types please refer to the example below. _______________________________________________________________________ As the author, I think the best method to describe the programming of the file compression interface is by example. What follows is intended to do just that. The text is narrated as if I were performing the process myself. E X A M P L E Suppose my objective is to switch my ARC utilities from the default programs (PKWARE) to the System Enhancement Associates (SEA) (tm) ARC (tm) compression utility programs version 6.00. Here is how it would be done; I would read the .DOC file for the SEA programs to get the commands needed and note the general format that they are placed on the command line. After some reading, I notice that the SEA program ARC.EXE will execute all of the needed commands and that it uses the same general format as the PKWARE command line. I also note that the SEA extract program ARCE.COM is completely incompatible as far as the command format goes. Well obviously I must use the SEA ARC.EXE program for both my packer and unpacker. I then go into SET-UP mode and set both my ARC compression AND my ARC extraction program to the drive:path and filename of ARC.EXE. A-3 The next thing I notice is the ARC External field. What this allows me to do is setup any program I want with any set of commands I want to work with ARC files. This program is defined just like the USER programs but works with compressed files. It is executed upon request from the COMPRESSED FILE MENU in the main StS program. I could set up a command to run a special compressed file viewer or maybe a batch file to create self-extracting files. Who knows what great things I can do with a 100% programmable command that runs from the compressed file menu. I'll wait till I find out what others are doing with this command and set it up later. Now that I have the program names setup, I must change to the SEA command set. I cursor down to the next line on the screen and look at the EXTENSION key. It is already set to ARC and since I am still going to be working with ARC files, I'll leave it alone and get on to the heavy stuff. I cursor down to the extract files command and type in the new command needed to extract files with. I recall that an upper-case X will do the job... That was easy, I do all the remaining commands the same way until I reach the SUFFIX types. What the H*** is this about I ask? Well it seems that the people who write these file compression systems all have their own ideas about how to send path names. Noting the help window on the screen I can see that StS supports three types of path passing strings. There are also four commands that the file utility programs use that need one of these suffix strings added to it in order to work properly. The EXTRACT, FRESHEN, UPDATE and CREATE commands all need the strings. The FRESHEN and UPDATE commands have exactly the same form in use so I have combined them into a single category. What I need to do here is enter three numbers which will tell StS what suffix to attach to each command. The first number represents what the EXTRACT command uses, the second number represents what the FRESHEN/UPDATE command uses and the third number represents what the CREATE command uses. From the ARC.EXE documentation I know that ARC.EXE requires the type 1 suffix string for all three commands, so my three number sequence will be 111. ____________________________________________________________________ SETUP for SEA(tm) ARC utility program: ARC Packer ......... ARC.EXE ARC un-packer ...... ARC.EXE EXTENSION trigger .. ARC EXTRACT files ...... X TYPE text files .... P DELETE files ....... D LIST files ......... L TEST integrity ..... T FRESHEN no add ..... F UPDATE and add ..... U CREATE new file .... A SUFFIX types ....... 111 ____________________________________________________________________ NOTES: ------------- This program has been tested with the above setup using the SEA ARC.EXE program and functions satisfactorily. The ability to "port" any other file compression utility other than the PKWARE series and ARC.EXE (version 6.00) is not guaranteed. A-4 ------------- The ability to edit the command strings used by the file compression programs also allows the user to "tune" the new ZIP program compression options. Although the defaults are quite good, I will leave the tinkering to you and your PK DOC file. We at M.R.E welcome your comments and suggestions about such "tuning" in our registered user conference on the BBS. Enjoy! -------------- Register your file compression utilities with their authors! Without them, where would we all be? B-1 APPENDIX B LICENSE / WARRANTY _____________________________________________________________________ >> Sec. B.1 LICENSE _____________________________________________________________________ StS ver. 4.10 is being distributed under the "shareware" or user supported concept. This software is NOT free software. The use or reproduction of this software outside of the limits specified in this license agreement is prohibited. Non-registered users are granted a limited license to use this software for a period not to exceed thirty days. During this period they should test and evaluate the software to determine if it will meet their needs. The use of this program beyond this limited time period requires registration. Non-registered users are not allowed to distribute this software without the express written permission of Microsystems Research & Engineering. The only exceptions to this distribution restriction are SYSOPS of electronic bulletin boards and distributors of public domain and user supported software. SYSOPS and software distributors must abide by the copying restrictions specified below. Registered users are granted the right to use StS on only one computer at any time. Site licensing agreements are available for businesses, corporations, and government agencies. Registered users are also granted the right to copy and distribute StS subject to the following conditions. StS must be copied in its original unmodified form. All of the files must be included in the copy. No fee or charge may be requested or paid to any licensee by the recipient of the copy. StS may not be distributed in conjunction with any other product without the express written consent of MRE Software. B-2 >> Sec. B.2 WARRANTY _____________________________________________________________________ Microsystems Research and Engineering makes no warranty of any kind, express or implied, including without limitation, any warranties of merchantability and or fitness for a particular purpose. Microsystems Research and Engineering shall not be liable for any damages, whether direct, indirect, special or consequential arising from a failure of this program to operate in the manner desired by the user. Microsystems Research and Engineering shall not be liable for any damage to data or property which may be caused directly or indirectly by use of the program. IN NO EVENT WILL Microsystems Research and Engineering BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR ANY DAMAGES, INCLUDING ANY LOST PROFITS, LOST SAVINGS OR OTHER INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF YOUR USE OR INABILITY TO USE THE PROGRAM, OR FOR ANY CLAIM BY ANY OTHER PARTY. >> Sec. B.3 TRADEMARKS _____________________________________________________________________ IBM, IBM PC-XT-AT-PCjr-PS/2 and PC-DOS are registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation. Microsoft, MS-DOS, MASM, and Microsoft Macro Assembler are registered trademarks of Microsoft Inc. LIST.COM was written by and (C.) Copyright Vern Buerg ProComm is a registered trademark of Datastorm Technologies Inc. PC-BOARD is a registered trademark of Clark Development Co. SEA, ARC, ARCE (tm) System Enhancements Associates PKZIP, PKUNZIP, PKWARE, (tm) PKWARE inc. Other tradenames are referenced where they occur. SPECIAL NOTE TO USERS WHO PURCHASED THIS PROGRAM VIA ONE OF OUR ADS. You ARE a registered user! Section C of the .DOC file has been included in the interest of completeness. It details all of the benefits you are entitled to as a registered user and also provides an order form so that you may order more copies. - you may discard this page - C-1 APPENDIX C REGISTRATION _____________________________________________________________________ Sec. C.1 WHY SHOULD I REGISTER ? _____________________________________________________________________ StS is distributed under the shareware concept. Shareware is a unique marketing concept born of the computer revolution. Users are allowed to obtain complete working programs to freely test and evaluate for a limited time period. If they find the programs useful then they are required to register their copy of the program. The small registration fee goes to support the authors and encourage them to continue to improve the software. Shareware depends on honesty. The computer programs are freely distributed as finished products. The authors of this type of program depend completely on the honesty of end users for compensation for their work. If you use a shareware program, any shareware program, please be honest and register your copy. Shareware is not free software. It requires just as much work and effort to produce as the highly advertised commercial products, but it usually sells for a small fraction of the price. Registering a shareware program also gives you the unique opportunity to do something that is virtually impossible with most commercial software. When you register, your comments and ideas are usually communicated directly to the author of the program and the response you will receive is from him/her. This fact assures you that your ideas are heard by someone who is paying attention. It is also from this pool of suggestions and ideas that future improvements improvements are spawned. Shareware companies in general don't spend millions of dollars doing "market research" or advertising the heck out of their products in order to sell you something that you have only read about. We lay it out there on the line....here it is....fully functional....you like it, please buy it, you don't .... erase it. We also don't charge you $400.00 for our products. Don't take this the wrong way however, commercial software is a necessity. God knows that this program would not exist if it weren't for MS-DOS and MASM. (which are quality, reasonably priced, and supported). Shareware that is of high quality at low prices does tend to keep all software prices lower and is therefor a necessity in its own right. When you support shareware you not only receive the right to use a good program (usually with free updates) but you also make a statement to the entire software industry. Make the free world economy work! Register shareware. C-2 >> Sec. C.2 REGISTRATION FEES _____________________________________________________________________ The registration fee for StS version 4.10 is only $25.00. This small registration fee entitles the user to use any shareware version of StS for life. It also entitles the user to one year's access to the M.R.E. Software support BBS and one year's free updates to the registered version of StS which is downloadable from the BBS. Registered users are also entitled to update their registered versions at any time after the first year for the yearly subscription fee that is currently set at $10.00. The $10.00 subscription fee goes to cover our cost of maintaining names and passwords on the BBS and will always be kept at the lowest feasible rate. This update fee is not based on a year to year subscription rate like a magazine, the user can update anytime, even skipping months or years, without any additional cost incurred. The year of access to the BBS will start on the date we receive the update payment. All registered users, including those who just pay the initial registration fee, will be notified of all major updates and changes to StS for a minimum period of five years. M.R.E. Software will also ship disk copies of StS to users based on the following pricing arrangement. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- StS shareware version (no registration) .................... $5.00 StS shareware version (no registration) on 3.5 inch media .. $7.00 StS registered version & first time registration ........... $30.00 StS registered version & first time registration (3.5 disk)..$32.00 StS registered version update. (for 1 year from reg) ....... $5.00 StS registered version update. (for 1 year from reg) (3.5).. $7.00 StS registered version and 1 year subscription update ...... $15.00 StS registered version and 1 year subscription update (3.5). $17.00 StS registered user BBS support & download privileges only. $10.00/yr after the first year which is included with registration. The basic charge amounts to $5.00 for the diskette and shipping plus any registration or update fees. 3.5 inch floppies are also available for an additional $2.00 per disk. Please specify 3.5 inch diskettes when you order. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- C-3 Sec. C.3 SITE LICENSE/QUANTITY DISCOUNT _____________________________________________________________________ Quantity discounts are available for $20.00 per copy to qualified businesses, corporations, individuals, and government agencies. This represents a $5.00 per copy or 20% savings. A minimum of five copies must be registered to qualify. Site licensed organizations will receive a 5.25 inch diskette which contains a current registered version of StS. Holders of site licensed copies share all the same privileges as single copy holders concerning access to free updates for one year and the minimal fee of $10.00 per year to update. Even if your organization holds 1000 copies of StS they can be updated by simply downloading, or requesting shipment of the latest registered version of the program for just $10.00 for each year's worth of updates. Businesses may of course register less than five copies at the individual copy price. (OPTIONAL) Upon request, M.R.E. Software will ship the 5 or more registered copies of StS on individual 5.25 inch floppy disk for $2.50 per copy provided they are all shipped to one location. This represents a total cost of $27.50 per copy for five or more copies shipped on disk. 3.5 inch diskettes are also available for 4.50 per copy. Please specify when you order. BUSINESS USERS OR GOVERNMENT AGENCIES REQUIRING LARGE QUANTITIES, NETWORK LICENSES, SPECIAL PURCHASING INFORMATION Contact Kathleen Griffin at our Alabama sales office voice number. (205) 658-2611 or write to: M.R.E. Software 206 Jones St. West Point, Ms. 39773 >> Sec C.4 THE M.R.E SUPPORT BBS _____________________________________________________________________ M.R.E. Software provides a support bulletin board system for distributing the latest versions of StS, on-line registration, and processing user questions and suggestions. We are running the latest version of PC-BOARD and StS author Emery Wooten is the sysop. Non-Registered users: Will be given limited access to the BBS. We are currently running an "open" system and no delay is imposed requiring you to make two calls to gain access. Non registered users will be provided with access to the main message base, the MRE file area, and the on-line registration procedure. You will be able to download the latest shareware version of StS, E88, and other selected files. Questions and suggestions from non-registered users will be processed as time permits. C-4 Registered users: Will be given complete access to the BBS with full time allocation for a period of one year. Registration will entitle the user to join the StS conference area. The StS conference provides a forum for discussion and presentation of comments, ideas, problems, and suggestions related to the StS program. This conference also has a separate file area where the latest REGISTERED version of StS can always be found. Registered users are always given priority support and consideration relating to their questions and suggestions. Additional access to the StS conference can be obtained at anytime for the nominal update fee of $10.00 per year. Please see section C.2 of this .DOC file for more information related to user registration privileges. 300 to 9600-V BPS N-8-1 Running HAYES 9600 ULTRA V.32 Telephone: (601) 494-8078 <data> 24 hours/day 7 days/week You are invited! >> Sec C.5 REGISTRATION FORM _____________________________________________________________________ This section contains the StS registration form. It is meant to provide users with a convenient means to register. Please type or print clearly. THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT! C-5 StS REGISTRATION FORM ver. s4.10 YES! I would like to register my copy(s) of StS. Please type with your text editor or print clearly! Name .............:__________________________________________________ Street Address ...:__________________________________________________ City .............:__________________________________________________ State and country.:______________________________ Zip:_____________ Company/Title (optional)....: _______________________________________ Where did you obtain StS? : _________________________________________ ----------------- One to 4 copies registration --------------------- 1 to 4 copy(s) registration fee = $25.00 * ___ copy(s)= $ _____.00 Send 5.25 inch disk copy(s) s&h = $5.00 * ___ copy(s) +$ _____.00 Send 3.50 inch disk copy(s) s&h = $7.00 * ___ copy(s) +$ _____.00 Mississippi residents add 7% sales tax ............... +$ _____.__ Overseas shipping is $3.00 (other than US and Canada) +$ _____.00 Total enclosed: $ _____.__ ----------------- Five or more copy site license ------------------- 5 or more copy(s) registration fee = $21.00 * ___ copy(s) $ _____.00 --- Site license includes one master disk & shipping.--- Additional 5.25 inch diskettes.... = $ 3.00 * ___ copy(s) +$ _____.00 Additional 3.50 inch diskettes.... = $ 5.00 * ___ copy(s) +$ _____.00 Mississippi residents add 7% sales tax ............... +$ _____.__ Overseas shipping is $3.00 (other than US and Canada) +$ _____.00 Total enclosed: $ _____.__ --------------------------- Payment method --------------------------- check one: __ Check or Money Order __ Company PO. __ VISA __ MasterCard Card #: ______ ______ ______ ______ Expires date: / Card issuing bank name: ____________________________________________ your signature __________________________________tel.(___)____-_____ * You MUST sign this form if using a credit card. --------------------------------------------------------------------- * MAIL THIS FORM TO: | Checklist: Credit card expiration date. M.R.E. Software | Your ZIP code. 206 E. Jones St. | Overseas shipping charge. West Point, MS. 39773 | Payment enclosed. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Be sure to read the appendix sections of the STS.DOC file for complete details on registration prividledges, updates, and BBS support! THANK YOU!!