PC Plus SuperCD (UK) 1997 May

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Text File | 1993-04-12 | 14.1 KB | 255 lines

University of Vaasa, Finland, Sun IPX SPARCstation garbo.uwasa.fi has a large collection of PD and shareware PC programs available by anonymous ftp or mail server. The file /pc/ts/0news-ts contains news about the TS-programs in the /pc/ts directory (in reverse order). This text, which you now have, is an extract from the 0news-ts file. .................................................................. Prof. Timo Salmi Co-moderator of comp.archives.msdos.announce Moderating at garbo.uwasa.fi anonymous FTP archives 128.214.87.1 Faculty of Accounting & Industrial Management; University of Vaasa Internet: ts@uwasa.fi Bitnet: salmi@finfun ; SF-65101, Finland .................................................................. Mon 12-Apr-93: I have updated "PESTIKID.EXE Keep your computer to yourself, lock keyboard" This program locks the keyboard and turns off alt-ctrl-del until you give your selected ascii code. As Iain Sillars sillarsi@logica.co.uk kindly noted, the ascii code 000 locks the system so that "the computer would not release without being switched off". In accordance to Iain's suggestion I have narrowed the range of acceptable asciis to 1-255. PESTIKID.EXE is in the upgraded garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle22.zip package. Please note that as my other recent updates it has been packed with PKZIP version 2.04G. Sun 6-Dec-92: I found a bug in my TDEL.EXE "Timo's safe recursive delete files and remove directories" version 1.2. The previous version sometimes detected non-existing directories. I think I pinpointed the elusive error in my code and hopefully have this bug corrected. While I was at it I also included a more detailed message why a directory cannot be removed. Example: "Directory not empty: Contains 2 subdirectories and 1 files". TDEL.EXE skips read-only files, but reports them. The updated version also reports hidden and system files (but does not allow deleting them). For Unix users I would describe TDEL.EXE as an MsDos counterpart rather than a direct port of the rm command. For MsDos users one could call TDEL.EXE a combined file deletion and directory-tree pruning utility. TDEL.EXE is a part of my consequently updated fifth utility collection from garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle21.zip. Thu 26-Nov-92: I have updated my TDEL.EXE "Timo's safe recursive delete". Besides being able to delete files, this program includes the option of removing directories recursively. The new version does the removing from bottom up, which makes using the utility very convenient. Of course you'll first have to make the directories empty by deleting the files from them, if any, but that is easy by first applying TDEL recursively on the files. A small practice set for ramdisk is included, because even with safe deleting and removing one has to know exactly what one is doing! The old method of removing from top to bottom has been preserved for compatibility. It has a special switch /f (force Forward). TDEL.EXE is a part of the consequently updated fifth utility collection from me garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle20.zip. Tue 6-Oct-92: I have updated my fifth utility collection to be garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle19.zip. CMOS.EXE "Display of the CMOS information" is a program that reads your battery backupped system information. The program now takes an optional switch /BW to run on an LDC laptop so that only two colors (LightGray / Black) are used. CMOS can take ? as a parameter. It then gives the usage information. CLOBBER.EXE "Delete files beyond undelete" is a new program in the collection. As you know there are several programs that can undelete deleted files, most notably the external undelete.exe program that comes with MsDos 5.0. CLOBBER works by rewriting your destination file full with ? and then deleting the file. Thus if one undeletes the file the original contents is no longer there. Be realistic if you wish a water-tight security. But beware. Although this can foil a "simple" undelete, there are programs that can read the sectors of the disk directly. If you update a sensitive file that often leaves old, unattached clusters of the file on the disk, and those can be read by a skillful snoop. On the other hand use CLOBBER judiciously because as a general rule you will lose the file for good (which is the exact purpose of CLOBBER). I have not been able to evaluate how well CLOBBER performs on a badly fragmented file. - All in all, there is a lesson to be learned here for those who trust encryption programs to protect their sensitive files. You should never encrypt them anywhere else than on a ram disk. If you use harddisk for even a temporary decryption, it may leave readable portions on the hard disk. It is not easy to access them, but it is not overly difficult. For example I have the tools and knowhow to do it. (No I will not disclose which and how, so please do not ask.) - I have tried to make CLOBBER fast. It uses its own 64Kb internal buffer, a kind of a programmed "disk cache". The programs are mostly self-documenting, but I added the documentations to the TSUTLE.INF information file so that they also are in one place. Sat 6-Jun-92: I have updated to garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle18.zip as follows. I have written a new SETVIDEO.EXE program for setting the CRT video mode. This program in fact originates from my own need to set the 132x43 text mode for (MsKermit) terminal emulation in order to read wide screens when connected to main frames like the Vaasa University garbo.uwasa.fi and chyde.uwasa.fi. It is easy to set the 40x25 in Turbo Pascal by applying TextMode(C40). Likewise it is fairly trivial to set the 80x43/50 text mode by applying TextMode (C80 + font8x8). But I initially had difficulties in finding out how to set the 132 text modes until David R. Conrad (David_Conrad@mts.cc.wayne.edu) kindly informed me that the interrupt 10hex function 00hex can be used for this purpose too. The way it goes is that the standard defines video modes from 00hex to 13hex, but in fact there are many more modes which depend on the particular video adapter card. This information can be found in Ralf Brown's list of interrupts INTERRUP.A in inter30a.zip (located in the /pc/programming directory at garbo.uwasa.fi). The problem is that the different video adapter cards have different defaults for the beyond 13hex video modes. I have used the following solution. You give the video mode as a hex parameter to SETVIDEO.EXE rather than choose from a menu of preset video modes. The values to give for the different video adapter cards can be found in the said INTERRUP.A information file if you look at INT 10h, function 00h. There is a very long list in there. For my own 386s the text modes are $00 = 40x25 $01 = 40x25 $02 = 80x25 $03 = 80x25 $50 = 80x30 $51 = 80x43 $52 = 132x25 $53 = 132x25 $54 = 132x30 $55 = 132x43 $56 = 132x60 Sat 21-Mar-92: I have updated my CMOS.EXE program which displays information from your battery backupped CMOS memory. - Made the CMOS clock display continuous. - Omitted the weekday information because it has turned out to be volatile. - Added the display of whether a math coprocessor is installed according to the CMOS configuration information. I have consequently released an updated version of my fifth utility collection. It is now garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle17.zip. Mon 2-Mar-92: The modern PCs have a battery backupped CMOS memory which includes the backed-up clock to store the date and the time, and configuration information. This battery usually lasts for several years, but eventually it will lose power. The current (pardon the pun) state of the battery can be checked by programming since as long as the battery is giving power is a certain bit in CMOS memory is on, and if the battery looses power the bit will be off. I have written a program CMOSALAR.EXE to read this bit. If the battery bit is off, an alarm will be sounded. One option is to put it in your autoexec.bat where it will act as a sentinel for you. Another similar program added is CMOS.EXE which displays information from your battery backupped CMOS memory. A color video adapter, and at least an AT PC is required. CMOSALAR.EXE and CMOS.EXE are part of my hence updated fifth utility collection garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle16.zip. The other three programs in the package are MSPLIT.EXE Split Unix elm email messages, for UseNet users PESTIKID.EXE Keep your computer to yourself, lock keyboard TDEL.EXE Timo's safe recursive delete for files & dirs PESTIKID.EXE has a small, invisible correction. The other two have not been changed. Sat 18-Jan-92: I have updated my PESTIKID.EXE program which locks the keyboard (unless the user knows the code to unlock it). The following features have been added: - The alt-ctrl-del combination is inactivated for the time the program is running. Thus the pesty user cannot beat PESTIKID.EXE by the simple alt-ctrl-del warm boot. The user either has to know the unlock code or reset your PC physically. - There is an optional message that is flashed to the screen if any other key is pressed except the unlock code. The message is invoked by a new /w (warning word) switch. You can choose the word yourself, or if you just use /w, "Hands off" will be flashed as the default. The flash is given in LightRed on Blue. The screen is restored to blank Black after the flash. - The cursor can be turned off for the duration of the program. The new /c switch is for turning the cursor off. - Improved a bit the error messages if incorrect parameters are given in the program call PESTIKID.EXE is a part of my consequently updated fifth utility collection garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle15.zip. The other two programs in the package are MSPLIT.EXE Split Unix elm email messages TDEL.EXE Timo's safe recursive delete but they have not been changed. Sun 15-Dec-91: I have updated my TDEL.EXE safe interactive recursive delete program. - It now accepts multiple file definitions. In other words the usage now is TDEL FileMask1 [[FileMask2]..] [switches]. For example TDEL /s c:\*.bak c:\*.bck would delete all *.bak and *.bck files on drive C:. - Added a /c "set Counter on" switch to give the count of the deleted, skipped, and the total of found files. - Corrected an error in the recursive mode of the program. It prevented full recursion when the file mask was not *.*. - Included an interception if the user tries to put wildcards in the directory part of the mask, as in TDEL C:\TEXT*\*.BCK. - When the program exits it now clears the keyboard typeahead buffer on exit. - Included a simple example on the help screen (which is invoked if you call TDEL without any parameters). TDEL.EXE is part of my hence updated fifth utility collection garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle14.zip. Thu 5-Dec-1991: I have updated my MSPLIT.EXE program for splitting Unix email files on a PC. - Earlier the split was effected when MSPLIT first encountered a "From: " and then a "Subject: " on the next line. I have made it more general. The first line start criterion is now "From: " or "From ". The second line criterion is "Subject: " or "Return-Path: " or "Article: " or "Received: ". - The count of messages is now given when the messages are directed to a single file separated by formfeeds (the /f switch). - The output now goes to the default directory. Not forcibly to the directory of input. - New switch /oDirectory to optionally direct the output to a desired destination MSPLIT.EXE is part of the updated garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle13.zip package. Sun 1-Nov-91: I have written a TDEL.EXE program for safe deleting of files. It asks for confirmation before deleting. Besides this ordinary usage TDEL has an optional, special feature. One quite frequently asked PC related question seems to be how one can delete all the files from a directory and all its subdirectories, and finally also the directory and subdirectories. There are several solutions to this problem, and I wanted to add one more putting emphasis on the safety of the operation. TDEL.EXE has a switch for recursing into subdirectories. TDEL.EXE can optionally be used also for removing directories and subdirectories. TDEL.EXE is part of the updated garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle12.zip package. Thu 28-Nov-91: Occasionally I want to download to my PC the email messages that I have received on our Unix machine (chyde.uwasa.fi). The messages are in a single file. I want to be able to split the email messages into separate files (or insert formfeed between them) to easily print them on our PC network laser printer. I wrote an MSPLIT.EXE program to do the splitting for me. I included it in my now updated garbo.uwasa.fi:/pc/ts/tsutle11.arc utilities package. Let me give some further background. On chyde I read my email using elm (2.3 pl11), and I have the following definition in the elm options submenu: P)rint mail using : cat >> /u2/econ/ts/posti/mail. This means that each message in the mail file starts by From: Subject: To: Date: MSPLIT.EXE splits the messages into mail.001, mail.002, etc when it encounters the From: Subject: pair. Or if you define so (/f switch) it inserts a formfeed before each message in a single mail.001 file. The program has also optional switches for page length (/p) and performing a translation to Scandinavian ascii (/s), ie { to a", [ to A", and so on. Sat 20-Jul-91: We had a welcome, but a very noisy visit from from my wife's best friend's family with two incredibly lively kids. Between their reverberatingly intensive sessions of playing my computer games, I had to device a simple, temporary lock for the computer, and came up with pestikid.exe. (I just can't resist the challenge of making up these puns in a language that is not my own). The program simply intercepts all input from the keyboard except for a given ascii code (I used 150), which unlocks the keyboard. Since I felt it is time to start my fifth collection of utilities, I put it in a new /pc/ts/tsutle10.arc package, which is now available from garbo.uwasa.fi anonymous FTP archives.