JCSM Shareware Collection 1996 September

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<Iconshell manual summary> ....Please click on a title to go to the chapter QUICK REFERENCE DESCRIPTION OF AN ICON SELECTING AND VIEWING ICONS MOVING ICONS CHANGING PAGE OF FILE ICONS SELECTING FILES THE DESKTOP DISPLAYS CHANGING DRIVE LAUNCHING A PROGRAM ASSOCIATING A COMMAND WITH A FILE THE RUN ICON PULL-DOWN MENU THE DISK DIRECTORY WINDOW DESCRIPTIONS OF FILES: THE SHELL.EXT FILE SENDING DIRECTLY DOS COMMANDS TO QUIT Iconshell CREATING AN ICON WITH THE INSTALL COMMAND ADDING, MODIFYING, DELETING AN ICON THE COMMAND FIELD THE PROGRAM FIELD OPTIONS AND VARIABLES SETUP COLORS PICTURE ON BACKGROUND TO MOVE OR CHANGE SIZE OF A WINDOW RESTORING THE STANDARD DESKTOP LOCK/UNLOCK RENAMING FILE/DIR MOVING FILE MAKING DIR DELETING FILE/DIR FILE/DIR COPY DISK COPY DISK FORMAT PHANTOM FILENAMES BOARD.EXE TEXT FILE VIEWING DISK COMMANDS SWTOOLS HOW TO MAKE A NEW DESKTOP SUMMARY OF COMMAND KEYS PROBLEMS AND OFTEN ASKED QUESTIONS HOW TO CREATE IMAGES FOR ICONS ABOUT THE GRAPHICAL INTERFACE <Other programs> SHELLR.BAT SE.BAT DISKCOPY.BAT QUICK REFERENCE SELECT an icon, use the cursor keys or click once the left mouse button. LAUNCH select an icon, press ENTER or click twice. VIEW content of an icon, press 'v'. INSTALL an icon, select a file or directory and press 'i'. ASSOCIATE to launch a program with files, type '+' or click the right mouse button, select first the program, and then each file. MENU press ALT and underlined letter together. READ TEXT press 'r' ARCHIVE to view an archive in the directory window type ENTER DRIVE press A..F, with uppercase, to change drive. ICONS the space bat toggles display of installed or file icons. MASK to select files displayed as icon, use the 'b' command. RESTART Iconshell when exiting a program, requires: - loaded by SHELLR - proper option on in setup, COLORS if color or setup changed, press F2 to keep the changes. QUIT Iconshell, press F3 or q. OVERVIEW Iconshell is a useful DOS interface that make good use of the power of current computers to a friendlier access to softwares and commands. The keys and mouse usage is close to that of Windows (c), allowing using the two softwares but learning only one user interface. FEATURES OF Iconshell - It displays software and command as icons. - Allows automatical installation into icons. - Store options and variables with filenames. - Allows to associate icons together with two clicks, to launch a pro- gram with a file, or to execute a command with files. - Has file management at the menu: copy, format, and so on. - A directory window and a special added program to easily sail in directories. - A function to search a file on a disk. - A built-in file viewer, keyboard or mouse driven also. - Displays content of ZIP and LZH archives. - and it remain a very short program with all these features. Iconshell displays the current disk directory either as icons or text, and programs can be executed with the single click of the mouse on the icon or the filename. Automatical installation of the filenames and their path is also al- lowed to run them further without the search in disk sub-directories. Until 30 icons can sit on a desktop and each of them can store in data fields all DOS commands, filenames and following options that are typed to run a software in order. Complex line commands no longer require to refer at the manual, but once to install them. User can create unlimited number of desktop. Some commands are already installed, that are only examples, you can change them and add so much that you want. Finally, the functions of Iconshell, are all these you install in icons, including all DOS commands. DESCRIPTION OF AN ICON To see the data inside an icon, select it with the cursor keys and press the 'v' key. A green window shows the title, the image, the command and program fields. First of all, please to remember the difference between a command icon, that is an installed icon with data fields, and a file icon that is a file displayed as icon on the desktop. When I say only 'icon' that's referring to an installed icon. An icon has an image and a title and has two data fields not displayed on the desktop: - the COMMAND field for DOS commands, and - the PROGRAM field for a program with his path and options. The command field gets DOS commands, which will be executed without leaving Iconshell, as for example, a directory change before to run a program. It can also get a batch filename, a COM or EXE program. When one click on an icon, Iconshell always first performs the com- mand field, and then the program field. The program field gets the name of a program to run, with EXE or COM extension, and its options. Here are two examples of data fields: Example: Title: Word x.x COMMAND: cd \word PROGRAM: word mytext.doc Example: Title: Unpack COMMAND: PROGRAM: \tools\unpack a: \(file.pak) -x2 SELECTING AND VIEWING ICONS Use the cursor keys to move the cursor on an icon, then its title be- comes highlighted, press ENTER to execute it, or type a command key to apply a function on this icon. Using a mouse, move the mouse cursor on the image or the title of an icon, and click once to select this icon, click again to execute it. MOVING ICONS Press 'm'. The title of the current icon is now displayed with a yel- low background. Move the icon selection bar with the cursor keys to a new location, and press 'm' again or press ENTER, the icon will move to this new location. With the mouse, select an icon and click on the 'move' option in the pull-down menu, and repeat to move, or click on the ESC key at right of the title bar to cancel. CHANGING PAGE OF FILE ICONS When one move the mouse pointer on the left or right side of the screen, the mouse become an horizontal arrow. Click then to display a previous page of file icons that symbolically is at the left, or the next page that is at the right. The Page Up key, to view next files, and Page Down key, to view previous file, do the same with the key- board. SELECTING FILES THE DESKTOP DISPLAYS Press the 'b' key to access the dialog box. Press in order 'e', 'c', 'b', 't', 'd' to select/deselect files with EXE, COM, BAT extension, others files or directories. Press ENTER to exit. CHANGING DRIVE At bottom left of the screen, icons figure each available logical unit. Logical unit is all that MS-DOS recognizes as unit, including the pseudo B drive, virtual disks, and SUBST commands. To change for a unit, click on a unit icon or press the letter with the shift key held down . The B unit is always displayed, if here is no physical second disk drive present, MS-DOS creates a logical B unit and redirects the ac- cesses to the physical drive A. You can yourself define logical unit by using the SUBST command. For example: SUBST E: C:\WORK Iconshell displays then an E disk icon. LAUNCHING A PROGRAM Select an icon and press ENTER or click twice on the icon. If the program needs variables to be entered when one loads it, it will ask you to type them int a dialog box. One may also click on the program name in the directory window to execute it. Another way to give parameters is the association, that is detailed in the following chapter. Before one speaks about association, get clearly in mind the difference between the two methods: - one clicks the LEFT mouse button or one presses ENTER to run the program displayed as icon. - one clicks the RIGHT mouse button or one presses '+' to run a pro- gram with association of one or more other icons of files as parame- ters. When the program launched ends, one returns to DOS or Iconshell is re- loaded, according to the chosen option. To return to Iconshell, two things are necessary: 1) Iconshell must to have been loaded with the SHELLR command, either at the prompt line or by the AUTOEXEC.BAT file. 2) The option 'Self-reloading' must to be set on, it is the first line of the setup window. Sometimes, to return to Iconshell is not desirable. Some programs mo- dify the timer of the computer that change the time and date. Others erase the drivers that reside in memory. On must to boot the system after these programs, but it is very useful to reload automatically the DOS interface when one runs short programs often used. TO ASSOCIATE A COMMAND AND A FILE Commands in the disk sub-menu are performed on the currently selected icon, if a file icon, that is a kind of association. One may also associate an icon that holds a command with variable filenames in pa- renthesis, with file displayed as icon on the desktop. The filename will replace the string in parenthesis. One tags first the command icon by a press on the '+' key, then one tags one or more file icons by selecting them and pressing again '+'. With the mouse, one clicks once on a command icon with the right but- ton (the mouse pointer become a cross), and then one clicks on the icons of the file icons in order. When one has selected the first icon, its content is displayed at the bottom of the screen. And when on select the following icons, the re- placement of the strings in parenthesis appears simultaneously. If the first icon does not hold variables, the icon is simply selec- ted, nothing appears. When all variables are replaced by filenames, the command is automati- cally performed. Example: To load the program EDIT.EXE with the file TEXT.TXT: The installed icon EDIT must have a variable in parenthesis, as for example: EDIT (file) Select the installed icon EDIT, press '+', then select the file icon TEXT, press '+' again. EDIT (file) is replaced by EDIT TEXT.TXT... and the command is per- formed. Example: An icon holds the command CD \(dir) Selects this icon and press '+', the command will be displayed at the bottom of the screen. Then select an icon of a directory, 'my- dir', for example, and press '+' again: CD \mydir will then be dis- played, and the directory change is processed. THE RUN ICON The SHELL desktop holds an icon that has the RUN command installed in- to. This is an DOS extension, included into the Hlist & Plus software, from the same author, and that is given as a bonus to registered users. This command searches for a program in the whole disk, change directory, and run the program. It's only needed to click on the icon and type the name of the program to search. PULL-DOWN MENU To access the menu, hold down the ALT key and press a key among F, I, O, D, U. These letters are underlined on the menu bar. Press ENTER or the down cursor key to display a sub-menu. Use cursor keys to move the selection bar or to change sub-menu. Press ENTER to execute the command. If this command must apply to an icon, it will apply to the currently highlighted one. Each option has a shortcut key, that is either underlined or shown at the right of the command. Press ESC to quit the sub-menu or the menu. Using mouse: Do a mouse click on the menu bar to active it, click on a line of the sub-menu to execute the function. There are three buttons on the title bar. - The leftmost button is for displaying the version number, - the second at left that shows a double arrow toggles between icon or directory display, - the one at right, that shows a diamond, replaces the ESC key for the mouse. Summary of pull-down menu command: Files Directory: Display the current directory. Run: Execute an icon. Board mask: Select files to display on the desktop: EXE, COM, BAT, dir or data (all others). Dos command: Execute directly DOS commands. Help: List essential commands. About... Display copyright, current version and date. Exit: Return to DOS. Icons View: Display fields of a resident icon. Install: Create a resident icon from a file icon. Add: Opens a dialog box for resident icon creation. Change: Change fields/image of a resident icon. Delete: Remove an installed icon of the board (not the files). Move: Reorganize the desktop. Options Setup: Change configuration. Colours: Open the window for preferences setting. Save config: Save changes made on display (changes on resident icons are automatically saved). Std desktop: Retrieve all defaults: colours, window sizes, etc... Disk Lock file Protect a file against deletion. Rename Rename currently selected, highlighted, file or directory, or move it elsewhere on the disk. Make dir Create a new sub-directory. Del Delete the highlighted file or directory if empty. Copy Copy a file or a directory and its sub-directories. Disk copy Copy a disk. Format Format a disk. Utilities Where is Search for a filename or pattern anywhere on a given drive. Read file Display a text file. THE DISK DIRECTORY WINDOW The 'd' command allows a larger disk directory list that is dis- played as text inside a window. Filenames have black letters, and sub-directories red letters. Files are displayed according to the mask specified by the mask setting and that is displayed as yellow squares on the window's title bar. When the squares are yellow, the file having this extension are inclu- ded in the list. Simply click on the squares to change the setting. The shortcut keys are these: - e: for EXE files. - c: for COM files. - b: for BAT files. - t: for all other files. - d: for directories. Other commands in the directory window: - ESC: exits, returns to board of icons. - cursor keys, to select or scroll. - ?: Display more info: show file size and date, press ? again to return to condensed display. - r: view the file. - A..F (uppercases) change drive. - ENTER: acts on the highlighted entry, > if a directory, performs a change dir. The '..' sub-directory returns to the previous level. > if a program (EXE, COM, BAT), runs it. > if an archive (ZIP or LZH), displays it's content. Press ENTER again to return to directory. > otherwise, ENTER calls the file viewer. - ALT-SPACE: open the menu, then cursor is used to move or to change the size. Using mouse, click once on an entry to select it, or use the lift at the right of the window, and click twice to replace 'ENTER'. To exit, do a mouse click out of the window. This function shows up to 256 file or directory names. DESCRIPTIONS OF FILES: THE SHELL.EXT FILE If the extended directory option is chosen, the window display the si- zes, dates, and a short description of the file according to its ex- tension. These descriptions are stored inside the SHELL.EXT file, that may be edited by the user with any text editor. A line may be until 44 cha- racters long, and start with the three letters extension followed by a space. Until 32 lines may be included in the file, if a registered version. The unregistered version holds only 8 lines and allows only to change existing descriptions. SENDING DIRECTLY DOS COMMANDS Press 'o', and type a DOS command into the dialog box. TO QUIT Iconshell Press 'q' to exit and save options of the display (windows, co- lours, ...) as they are not stored in the CFG file until there is change relating to icons or the F2 key is pressed. Press F3 to exit without saving the last changes. Alternate keys to F3: ALT-F4, ALT-X. To do a mouse click on the diamond at right of the title bar, is the same that pressing the F3 keys. CREATING AN ICON WITH THE INSTALL COMMAND Installation avoids to search a program in a sub-directory, and al- lows to put the options at command line if required. Move the cursor on the file icon on the desktop and type 'i'. A dialog box displays the content of the future resident icon when ins- talled: - title, that is the node of the filename, - a change drive and directory command, - the program name. You may edit these data now. Press ESC to cancel. ADDING, MODIFYING, DELETING ICONS To add a new Icon, press 'a'. A dialog box will appears. This box shows an image of icon that is the first in buffer, you may choose the image with the PAGE UP/DOWN keys. To change line, use the up/down cursor keys. Don't press ENTER when a field is filled. All that is on the screen is also in the memory, and the ENTER key serves to save data and to close the dialog box... One may also click on the 'Get' button to save and quit. Or one may press ESC or click on the Cancel button. The title can be 16 letters long, other fields have size limited by the window width, and they are specially described in the two follo- wing paragraphs. The windows can be enlarged by a press on the ALT-SPACE key, or a mouse click on the borders (See later for details of that). To modify an existing icon, the command is: 'c'. Then, there is no difference with the 'add' or 'install' function. To delete an installed icon, press DEL, and confirm by a press on the 'y' key or a mouse click on the Ok button. To cancel, press 'n' or ESC or click on the Cancel button. THE COMMAND FIELD This field gets any DOS command as typed on the DOS line command. Starting MS-DOS version 5, one can chain several commands separated by '|' symbol. If the field remains blank, the program ignores it when the icon is selected. A batch filename (BAT), a program with COM or EXE extension are valid commands. One must verify that the process will not have memory action that can erase Iconshell, as it remains in memory when the COMMAND field is performed. The program must run in remaining memory, that is 400-500k according to the configuration. If the command uses variable data, put a string in parenthesis for re- placing at the execution time or for association. When one click on the icon with the left mouse button, Iconshell opens a dialog box for the replacement of the string, when one clicks with the right button, Iconshell wait for another click on an icon of file, and it makes the replacement of the string by the filename with the path. THE PROGRAM FIELD The program field gets a program name with 'EXE', 'COM' or 'BAT' extension. One may set the path of the file. This field can remain blank if the icon represents only a DOS com- mand. The program name (but BAT file) can be followed by several parameters until a maximum of 7, separated by a space. The first parameter can be separated of the name by '/', if this is a correct syntax for this program. Example, to execute Windows in standard mode: win/s The program field as the command field allows string to replace at the execution time. Including substituting strings the fields can be until 160 characters long. OPTIONS AND VARIABLES Some programs as PKUNZIP, LHA, have many parameters including filename that change each time, so to avoid often to type their complex syn- tax, Iconshell allows strings to replace that are in parenthesis. When the icon will be performed, Iconshell will ask for replacement. a) Example of replacement for the command fields. COMMAND: cd \(directory) When one does a mouse click on this icon a message is displayed: Replace or press ENTER to keep directory..................... If one types for example, 'windows', the string is replaced and paren- thesis are removed, that will produce the following result: cd \windows If one presses only ENTER, the string that is the default remains, and this produces: cd \directory b) Example of replacement for the program field. PROGRAM: unpack -t a:(SOURCE) (DESTINATION) At the click on the icon, Iconshell asks: Replace or press ENTER to keep SOURCE........................ Type for example: MEGAPROG.PAK.................. Iconshell then asks: replace or press ENTER to keep DESTINATION................... Type for example: c:\temp....................... Substitutions will produce the following result: unpack -d a:MEGAPROG.PAK c:\temp SETUP AND DISPLAY SETUP Type 'u' to open the setup dialog box. Following option may be changed: Automatically return to Iconshell Type 'a' to switch the selection. The self-reloading will work only if Iconshell has been load by the SHELLR command. Screen resolution. The desktop may have two screen resolutions: - the medium resolution, or EGA, or VGA 16. - the high resolution or VGA 18, 640 x 480 pixels. Press 's' to change this option. The high resolution allows until 30 installed icon, and one may not switch to the medium resolution if more than 20 icons are created. Background picture The registered version allow display of an VGA or EGA 16 colors pic- ture as background. Press the 'p' key to select/deselect the display of the picture. That can also be done from the desktop. Display of current path and available disk space. Press 'f' to change. Display file icon on the remaining space on the desktop. Press 'i' to change. Display either installed icons or file icons only. Press 'o' to change. From the desktop press SPACE to change. COLORS To change the colors of the desktop, press the F5 key to open the dialog box, then select an item with the TAB key or vertical arrows, and click on a color or use the horizontal arrows cursor to move to the chosen color. The police for icon titles may be changed by pressing the 'f' key. A new color may be created for the desktop background. Just do a click on the buttons at left or right of each of the three colored squares, that represent the RGB, red, greed, blue registers. On key- board the following keys may be pressed instead: r, R, g, G, b, B. Title bar and background of windows can be directly changed when they are opened, with ALT-b and ALT-h or by selecting the window menu with ALT-SPACE, and then using 'b' or 'h' commands. To restore all defaults press 'z'. All changes relating to display will be cleared and the initial desktop restored. Changes on icons are preserved however. To forget all changes including icons, erase the file SHELL.CFG, it will be rewritten with default icons. TO MOVE OR CHANGE SIZE OF A WINDOW If the window has a button with a 'w' letter in the upper left cor- ner, it has a system menu that holds the 'move' and 'size' options, one presses ALT-SPACE to get the menu. If the window doesn't have the button, to press ALT-SPACE goes directly to the move/size mode and a dotted rectangle appears. With the mouse, if moving is allowed, the mouse cursor becomes four arrows when the mouse stays on the left or top border of the window. If changing the size of a window is allowed, a horizontal arrow replaces the standard arrow when the mouse pointer stays on the right or bottom border. To do the change with the mouse, hold down the left button and drag, then click once the right button to exit. With the keyboard, when selecting specifically either the move or size option is possible, one uses the cursor keys to do the change, exactly as in Windows (c). Otherwise, when it is a dialog box and the ALT-SPACE command sets a global change mode, one uses the cursor keys to move the box, and one holds down the ALT key and presses the cursor keys simultaneously to change the size. There are also alternate keys to change the size: '>' increases width '<' reduces width, '+' increases height, '-' reduces height. Press ESC or ENTER to exit. RESTORING THE STANDARD DESKTOP Press the 'z' key. All changes on the display will be erased and the standard desktop will be restored. This doesn't clear the changes to the icons. To retrieve the standard icons, erase the SHELL.CFG file, il will be rebuilt with the standard icons. LOCK/UNLOCK To protect a file against deletion, use the command 'l'. Attributes are then displayed as ASHR: A: archive S: system H: hide R: read only Only the 'read only' attribute can be changed here, for any other attribute, use the 'o' command. Press 'l' or '+' to lock the file, 'u' or '-' to unlock it. RENAMING FILE/DIR To rename a file or a directory use the 'n' command and type the new name into the input box.. MOVING FILE Moving a file on the same disk is allowed by the rename command also. Press 'n' and type a new path for the file selected, with the same or a new name. Moving a file on another disk is not allowed by this command, but the MS-DOS or other move command may be installed into an icon. I want only use commands that may not cause by error lost of file. MAKING DIR To make a directory, use the command 'k'. DELETING FILE/DIR To delete a file or an empty directory, use CTRL+d. FILE/DIR COPY To copy the currentlry selected file or directory with its sub-direc- tories, type 'y', then a window displays the directories to the user selects the destination path. One moves to the proper path, not only one moves the cursor on a di- rectory name, but changes to it, then presses 'y' again to do the co- py. DISK COPY To copy a disk, type '$'. This command run either the DISKCOPY.BAT file if present in the Iconshell directory or the MS-DOS diskcopy.com command. DISKCOPY.BAT holds a generic program name, 'diskdup' that copies a disk in one pass by storing the disk image on a hard drive. If you don't own a program of this kind, simply erase the DISKCOPY.BAT file and the MS-DOS command will be directly called. Of course, you may edit DISKCOPY.BAT to put another name for the one-pass duplicator, as- suming it requires as first parameter the name of the disk to copy and as second parameter the name of the unit to store the disk image. Some programs use another syntax and you must deal with it to adapt the batch file. One may choose the option 'DOS diskcopy' that is for a standard copy using the MS-DOS diskcopy.com program, or 'Disk image', for a copy with a one-pass duplicator. In both cases one selects with the Source button the disk drive that holds the disk to copy. In the DOS diskcopy case, one selects with the Target button the disk drive that holds the backup disk. In the second case, one selects with the Image button the unit where the disk image is temporary stored. DISK FORMAT To format a disk, type 'f', then select either the drive A or B, by a press on the 'd' key, and select the DOS format method for a 1.44 disk: - Certify: this is the standard format command. The DOS format the disk and verify each sector. - Quick: this corresponds to the /Q option of MS-DOS that clear only the FAT and directories. For other options or other kind of disk, some examples of icons are provided on the Disk command desktop. PHANTOM FILENAMES 'Phantom files' are programs integrated to Iconshell, that can sit in the command or program field, as programs on disk. There are currently: EXIT.EXE Its action is to return to DOS. QUIT.EXE saves display changes and return to DOS. WAIT.EXE waits for a key press. Useful when a command displays some- thing just before to exit. BOARD.EXE with CFG filename as parameter, allows loading a new desktop. CLOCK.EXE Displays the time. DIRECTORY Shows the current disk directory in a window. CDD Change drive and directory. If by chance one wants to put real program with the same name in a fields of an icon, or same name with 'COM' extension, one must specify the path (for example: C:CDD.COM), and Iconshell runs the file from disk rather to execute the phantom programs. BOARD.EXE This integrated program allows multiple desktops. One uses the 'a' command to create a new icon, fills the command field, for example: BOARD.EXE C:\MYBOARD.CFG Then a click on this icon will display until 30 new icons. There is no limit but the disk size to the number of boards. It is preferable to put the complete path of the config file, as the icon can be selected from another sub-directory. The registered version recognizes a second parameter to a file of icon images, a background picture, and a file of icons, as extra para- meters, in order. WHERE IS Locate a filename. Use the command 'w'. Search for a filename or pattern in a whole drive, starting at the root directory. ESC can abort the process. Examples: c:*.exe or a:FILENAME.EXE or FILENAME.EXE and so on... TEXT FILE VIEWING To display the content of a file on the desktop, press the 'r' key, or simply ENTER, but for a file with BAT extension. The built-in viewer may read files having 32767 lines, and up to 32 megabytes. However, the more the size increases, the more the speed slows down, it is in fact intended to easily read all these short text files you often find around, including the Iconshell's help file. Commands are these: ESC: exit. Cursor key: scroll up or down a line, or move horizontally the win- dow on the text. Page up: display previous screen page. Page down: display next screen page. HOME: jump to start of file. END: jump to end of text in memory. t: change text and background color. By a mouse click on a button upon the text window one passes the same commands. DISK COMMANDS DOS disk commands are available either within the menu, or on the desktop. Commands in the menu are special improved built-in commands or simply those of DOS, as Iconshell is a shell to DOS. File and disk copy, format, use the DOS commands with a graphical interface to make them friendly. MD Make a directory. Use the command 'k'. DEL Delete a file or an empty directory. Use CTRL+d. REN Rename a file or a directory or move a file in another directory. Use 'n' and type the new name, and optionally type a new path. LOCK Protect a file against deletion. Use the command 'l'. COPY Copy a file or a directory with its sub-directories. Use 'y' to copy the selected file or directory, then a window dis- plays the directories to you select the destination path. DISKCOPY Copy a disk. Type '$'. This command run either the DISKCOPY.BAT file if present inside the same directory that Iconshell, or otherwise the MS-DOS' DISKCOPY.COM command. FORMAT Format a disk. Type 'f' for a standard format, for other options or other kind of disk, some examples of icons are provided on the 'Disk command' desk- top. CHKDSK Checks a disk for correct allocation. Use the icon CHECK DISK. MEM Views memory. Use the icon MEM from MS-DOS version 5, of CHKDSK otherwise. All other commands described in the DOS manual can be installed into icons also. SWTOOLS In the shareware market, there are plenty of new improved useful com- mands to enhance the DOS base system. Some examples are already ty- ped on the SWTOOLS desktop: - Pkunzip (c) PKware. - Arj (c) R.K. Jung. - Lha (c) H. Yoshizaki. - Diskdup (c) R. K. Snyder. - V-Scan (c) McAffee Associates. - Run, go (c) D.G. Sureau. Many other commands may be installed in the same way, that you may find at shareware distributors and BBS. These programs generally re- quire one pays a licence to use them. HOW TO MAKE A NEW DESKTOP The program comes with some CFG files that contains desktop data. Creating a new CFG file is easy and done with the following steps: 1) Add a new icon, with these data into the program field: BOARD.EXE C:\MYBOARD.CFG BOARD.EXE is the 'phantom' program that loads an alternate desktop. 2) Click twice on this new icon. An error message is displayed, 'File no found: MYBOARD.CFG' This is normal, the program attempts to load it, does not found it, then restarts with default desktop. Note that the name 'MYBOARD', without extension, is now displayed on the title bar. 3) To make a new desktop, remove the icons you don't want to keep, and add those you want. To make a link with the main desktop, you may add an icon with BOARD.EXE C:\SHELL.CFG into the program field. Note that these paths are only for examples, any drive and directory may rather be used. Another simple method to create a new desktop is running Iconshell at the DOS prompt with the name of the new board as parameter. A message display "file not found", that you ignore, and the program start with the default board of icons with the name you have typed as title. You will further save the new desktop with F2, and add an icon to make the links from the main desktop to the new one. SUMMARY OF COMMAND KEYS F1 Display the help screen. h Display the copyright, version, date. Cursor keys Select icon, sub-menu, etc... ESCAPE Leave current function, window, menu, etc... ENTER Execute a function. + Launch a program by association with one or more files. SPACE BAR Toggle to installed icons or disk directory on the desktop. HOME Jump to the first file. PG up/down Scroll files on the desktop. v or END Show the content of an icon. i Install currently selected file as icon. a Add an icon. c Change an existing icon. DEL Remove an icon. m Move an icon ('m' to select icon, 'm' again to drop). ALT+key Get sub-menu or changes a color in desktop. o Execute directly DOS command. d Show directory. (+ ENTER to run a program). b Set desktop directory mask. Shift-A..F Change drive. w Find path of a filename. l Lock a file. n Rename a file or a directory. k Create a new directory. y Copy a file, or a directory. $ Copy a disk. f Format a disk. CTRL-d Delete the selected file or directory. r Display a file as ASCII. u Open the setup dialog box. F5 Open the dialog box for colors change. F2 Save the preferences. s Change screen resolution. p Set/Reset picture for background (Reg. ver. only) ALT-SPACE Change current window. z Restore standard settings. q Save changes and quit. F3 Exit. PROBLEMS AND OFTEN ASKED QUESTIONS 1) Don't put a resident program into the COMMAND field, as it will install itself in the middle of the memory! Use the Iconshell's reloa- ding feature to install resident programs and return to Iconshell. 2) If any problem appears on the Iconshell's display, this probably comes from a corrupted CFG file, or a CFG file that is for another software. Installing Iconshell's config files into a special sub-di- rectory and setting the proper paths in the icons will fix that problem. 3) The version 1.8 and following are not compatible with older ones. An attempt to load older CFG file will blank the screen and the pro- gram will hang (this has no effect on user's files). When installing the new version, be careful to erase all previous CFG files of Icon- Shell first. 4) Some programs that are normally launched when one puts their name in the program field, can't be loaded if one calls them within the command field. When it calls a program from the command field, Iconshell remains resident and the screen mode remains graphical. The launched program may use a way to display text that doesn't work on a graphic screen, unlike DOS commands. It may also oc- curs that the launched program can't fit in the available memory. 5) The "Out of memory" message may occur after you use Iconshell, if you have loaded directly a resident program. Look at the previous 1) paragraph about that. HOW TO CREATE IMAGES FOR ICONS The SHELL.SPR file holds 33 images that are icons of commercial or shareware softwares for DOS, or symbols of commands, and these icons are loaded or drawn, and stored into a compressed file with VIRTUAL REALITY TOOLS or SPRITES 18, that are also shareware. ABOUT THE GRAPHICAL INTERFACE Iconshell has been written in C and assembly 80286, using a graphical interface that I have written also. This interface is used yet by V. R. Tools, Sprites 18, Hlist and other programs that are currently in work. By using special graphical functions and with always the search of the simplest algorithm in mind, I write these so short pro- gram that do so much as commercial packages with 1/10 the size. The registered version of the software SPRITES 18 now includes a GUI li- brary that holds most features of the Iconshell's GUI. SHELLR.BAT This batch file allows Iconshell is restarted when exiting another program launched by Iconshell. SE.BAT The purpose of this program is going to C: root directory and run SHELLR from any disk and directory. If Iconshell is not installed on the c: drive, SE.BAT may be edited and the 'c' letter changed to the proper drive letter. DISKCOPY.BAT This program serves to load either the DOS diskcopy command or a re- placing one-pass program (not furnished) that stores the disk images on a hard drive unit. You may edit this file to change the name and path of programs it calls.