ftp.wwiv.com/ftp.wwiv.com.zip/ftp.wwiv.com/pub/HATCH/WWIVNEWS.ZIP/9407_3.NWS

Text File | 1994-07-24 | 23KB | 501 lines

for a bulletin board, I did not give up with my ideas of making the interface
of other aspects of a WWIV BBS a little more fun, and a LOT easier.

We found the main problem with our Pulldown Menu System was that sysops know
how to use WWIV, and do not need to use menus (myself and Sam included). Of
those that *did* put it in, they reported their new callers simply loved it,
and loved the ease at which they were able to navigate through the menus. Of
course, callers using Expert status would never know they were there.


COMMON POINTS OF REFERENCE
──────────────────────────

Current COMMON mods that exist are the User Pulldown Menus, ListPlus, Super
Config and QWK. There are a few other mods that require functions in COMMON,
but they are nowhere as complex as what we like to bill as "Asylum", rather,
modifications that grew out of necessity. TRYTOUL (Try To Upload) for example,
which allows you to upload files without entering a filename or description in
advance.


THE MAKING OF COMMON
────────────────────

The first stage of a COMMON mod, if it is to become good enough to be called
Asylum, is to come up with an idea that needs to be implemented, followed by
an extensive design process. Believe it or not, the design phase is the most
tedious and time-consuming portion of writing an Asylum Modification. I rarely
jump right into a huge mod and just start coding. It may be in my mind for a
month before I do anything, while I ponder over various ways to start to write
this in text mode, followed by pseudo-code, then finally, C code. This is true
of the Pulldown Menus, ListPlus (which had a design life of something like 2
months) and QWK.

Inspiration comes at weird times. Sometimes at work when I have a few minutes,
I will jot down on paper some design criterion and places I would like to go
with the mod, and decide what areas I am going to ignore for the time being.
Believe it or not, a lot of ideas come to me in the last place you would think
they would...the shower, in a chat with one of my callers, at work, and of
course, in conversation with Sam on the phone.

Eventually, I manage to come up with a pretty rough idea how it will work.

Once the program has enough features added that I think others would like to
try it out, I go ahead and have Sam try it out. If it can make it through HIS
complex set up, it can make it through about anything.

Inevitably, Sam sends in some bug reports, along with a HUGE amount of added-
feature requests.

Sam and I finally work out things and decide it is time to let our collection
of BRAVE beta testers give it a try. Again, in come a few bug reports and
more added-feature requests.

The months pass on, the mod we are working on grows into crazy proportions,
and finally Sam and I decide, what the heck, let's release it on the net.

Need I say what happens?  MORE bug reports, even after 6+ months of extensive
beta-testing by the greatest team of beta testers ever assembled, save that of
Wayne's beta-testing team. QWK recently had a dandy of a bug that went
completely undetected in the initial six months of testing, only to be found
the very next day after it was released on Modnet by a -very- observant Dave
Wallace and Emerald Lady. Needless to say, they are now members of our beta
testing team.

Within days, we actually have a working error-free version.


LISTPLUS
────────

I was resting on the laurels of my Pulldown Menus and we were feeling rather
proud of ourselves. Then one day, I called a local Vision/2 bbs. It was
simply awesome, and put what I felt was my greatest (at the time) achievement,
my Pulldown Menus, to complete shame.

I decided I HAD to write something of that quality for myself... and for WWIV.

So in a 6 hour long-distance phonecall between me and Sam, a new concept was
born that was destined to revolutionize WWIV's transfer section-  Listplus.
Public Relations was going to be critical if this was going to work. At the
time, there were a number of file-tagging mods available. Frank Reid's was
(possibly) the most popular. By this time, most all sysops that wanted file
tagging had already installed one of the existing taggers, and didn't feel
like digging it out just to install a new one that 'claimed' to be
better...especially buy a couple of guys that called themselves "Asylum"...

Sam posted numerous plugs about my new file-tagging mod. He showed it to
every sysop that called his board. That met with a lukewarm reception.
Something more was needed.

I remember a post about a sysop who lost his back up and started over, he
looked for the same file tagger he had before, but couldn't find it... luckily
our tagger was still on his sub and he put it in. The sysop posted a very
nice comment, something along the lines of not being able to stay in his chair
when he ran it, not believing what he saw (Gee, the same feeling I got when
I saw the Vision/2 file listing).

That, combined with a few other posts from people who took a chance and tried
it, (and more plugs by Sam), Listplus went from being "just another file
tagger" to a network-wide craze. EVERYONE, it seemed, was going ga-ga over
Listplus. People were calling and e-mailing from everywhere wanting it, and
anything and everything else from Asylum.

Asylum-mania had begun.

As time went on, Listplus went from a fairly 'rigid' mod, without any
configurations or extras, other than the arrow key tagging, to a mod that
supported extended descriptions, the most complete search/finding routines I
have seen on ANY BBS, user configurable file listing, and finally, plenty of
sysop configuration options, being able to set the color while in the BBS for
most any item, as well as being able to toggle most features on and off.

I also had the good luck of 4.23 coming out. Good luck because I was able to
test it on all 4.22 users, and had a *legitimate* reason of posting all the
fixes that had been done to it... labeled the '4.23 version of List Files
Plus' in it's entirety on Modnet.

By this time, I came up with my own ideas of making my mods a little more
popular as well as having my own confidence in my mods grow.


ASYLUM/QWK
──────────

With the popularity of ListPlus, I felt we were about as high as we would get
in WWIV modding. Then, Sam went multi-line and found (as did many others) that
most (all we tried) QWK mail packet generators would not work (at that time)
with non-standard IRQ's.

Asylum to the rescue!

I started writing Asylum QWK around September of 1993, but lost interest. But
with Sam going multi-line/multi-node, I now had a legitimate reason to put a
concentrated effort into it's development. Armed with possibly the greatest
beta-testing team ever assembled, save Wayne's, we put Asylum QWK through a
vigorous six month test period. Finally, in May 94 it was released on Modnet.
As it turns out, the beta team caught all but two minor bugs and one major bug.
Not to bad for a mod of this proportion. Those bugs were all killed, and now
Asylum QWK is the fastest QWK packet generator (that we have found) for WWIV
on the market. It has many features not found in other similar products, such
as the ability to configure your Q-Scan from within QWK, your ability to set
how many (in numbers, not bytes) messages you would like to be able to down-
load from each sub, as well as the total packet, an option to allow you to take
a percentage of posts from each sub, and it is internal, so the same functions
that limits a users time for the BBS, are used in Asylum QWK.

But the best option of all... it is free. Please note, however, that we will
not refuse any donations sent our way :-)

The public response to Asylum QWK has gone off the meter. Those who have tried
it have absolutely fallen in love with it's speed, flexibility, versatility,
and reliability. And if I must say so myself, our product support has been
second to none. Sam and I both have gone so far as to call people voice at our
own expense to help them get things set up and running right. So far, no one
(to our knowledge) has been disappointed.

We have offered the code to Wayne and WWIV Software Services free of charge to
include in WWIV. There has been a lot of debate on this topic on the #1 Sysops
Sub, with the vast majority of sysops opting for it to be included as either a
#define option or as a WWIV.INI option. With the onset of v4.24 of WWIV and
it's virtually unlimited message-base capability (in numbers of posts you can
keep in each sub), some sort of QWK is going to be nearly mandatory. By in-
cluding a QWK package in WWIV, it offers a very useful option, and makes WWIV
more attractive to new sysops. By making a way to turn it off (by #define or
INI), you appease those few sysops who would rather not have it. And by mak-
ing it free, everyone can use and enjoy it without having to worry about send-
ing money to someone to stop shareware delays or gain added features.

We understand that other mail generators are available, but it is our opinion
that the generator should be apart of the package of WWIV, included in the
same $80 as WWIV itself.


SUPER CONFIG
────────────

Super Config was released between Listplus and Asylum QWK. While it is a true
Asylum Mod, it doesn't have all the bells and whistles of the Pulldown Menus,
Listplus, or Asylum QWK. Still, no WWIV board should be without it. It is
a great addition to Asylum QWK. Basically, it allows you to set up your New-
Scan and File-Scan in true Asylum fashion, using your arrow keys and space-bar
to toggle on or off the subs you want to read, a page at a time. Super Config
is smart. It auto-detects if you are using conferencing, and adjusts itself
accordingly. Once you see it, you will not know how you ever lived without it
and your users will love you for using it.


MARKETING THE PRESENT
─────────────────────

Marketing opportunities have come in the strangest ways. After seeing all
that Sam had done to promote Asylum, I though he had covered just about
every avenue available.

But as I saw, with a little luck, creativity, and a little opposition, Sam
could still make people not only stand up and take notice of Asylum, but he
was actually able to get them discussing it!  Sam unintentionally started a
product war on the #1 Sysops Sub, and because of that, the Asylum Group is
now getting more attention than ever. I had sysops calling my board to find
QWK who didn't even know anything about ListPlus, let alone COMMON. Through
careful planning, inadvertent help from JAFO, a little luck, and the many
people posting their opinions supportive of Asylum, I now find people not
knowing about Asylum very few and far between.

With the popularity of Asylum QWK (it has already been downloaded over 150
times from Sam's BBS in just one week), and the fact that COMMON must be
installed to have QWK run, I find my previous mods now riding on the coat
tails of my newest mod. New users on my board (sysops in their own rite) that
didn't even know ListPlus, COMMON, Super Config, Pulldown Menus, and my few
non-COMMON mods existed are becoming institutionalized in Asylum themselves.


CHARTING THE FUTURE
───────────────────

The future for Asylum (and WWIV) is very bright. Ideas we are kicking around
include modifications to the sublist and dirlist functions, G-Files, and
Defaults. Maybe something that will pop up, possibly a network optimizer that
will take huge packets from servers and optimize them into message data file,
taking out redundant posts, leaving text files for each system, so that the
distant node can rebuild these packets into the correct form that the network
software wants to see it in. Sam is currently writing a new voting section
done in Asylum fashion. We have gone about as far as we can go with Listplus;
QWK may have a little un-tapped potential in it, but it is time to move on.
Any ideas people have are always considered, so if you are using one of these
and have an idea for a feature, be sure to let us know.

The motto we live by at Asylum is "Make 'em say "Wow!". Not only through the
flash and pizazz we put into every effort, but through product support as

well.

We strive in every modification we release to do just that.

Asylum! Say it like Sega!

Be sure to subscribe to the Asylum Support Sub. This sub seems to be more
active than Modnet and Mod Talk and Requests at times (at least it did after
Filo's HD crash :-)

  Subtype  @     Net
  ───────────────────────
  ASYLUM   2077  WWIVNet
  ASYLUM   5497  ICENet
  ASYLUM   5497  WWIVLink
  ASYLUM   5497  TerraNet

To get the ABSOLUTE latest version of my Asylum's Current mods, call the
Asylum HQ, but be forewarned, alphas and betas are usually what the latest
mod is.

My BBS is single node, but I keep it free, not keeping alot of files online
that local users would want to download.

Sam's board is a very active board, but it has three nodes, so you should be
able to get on without to many problems.

Sam's BBS will have mods that are tested and complete.

                     Asylum HQ               Sam's BBS
                     @7321 WWIVNet           @2077 WWIVNet
                     703-427-1214            210-659-7267
                     210-659-3541
                     210-659-9157


"THE FOLLOWING MEN ARE ARMED AND CONSIDERED DANGEROUS:"
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Zu Digital aka Michael Deweese is a 24 year old Heating and Air Tech. Mike
lives in Virginia and has been active in WWIVNet in one shape or another for
well over a year. Hopes to move on to become a full-fledged programmer before
to long. (Anyone got any openings?)  Also, in case Wayne is wondering, Enigma,
(Michael Dorsey) is the one you need to give a commission to for getting me

into WWIV and eventually registering.

Sam aka Sam Morris is 31 years old, lives in San Antonio Texas, and is
the Logistics Coordinator for the US Air Force's "Tops In Blue" touring
entertainment extravaganza. Sam has been heavily involved in WWIV and WWIVNet
for nearly 3½ years. He is a former Area Coordinator for North Dakota, and is
currently Filo's alternate Group Coordinator for Group 4.

Stephen Leprell, former member and name creator, now serving time... er,
serving our country. (I tried to talk him out of it, I feel me and Sam did
enough time for our country (Sam is still doing it). Probably over two decades
of military experience and service in our group between the three of us.

───────────────┬─────────────────────────────────────────────┬───────────────
               │           Filling in Gates' Gaps            │
               │  A Collection of Undocumented DOS Commands  │
               │       by MicroSource Sysop (1@15136)        │
               └─────────────────────────────────────────────┘

"DOS is great
 DOS is good
 Let us thank Bill
 For our...uh, wait, is that in the manual?"

Don't laugh too hard, because this is a sad but true fact. DOS may be one
of the best operating systems on the market today, and it's arguably the
most widely used, but there are several undocumented commands and switches
that would be very useful if we only knew what they were!

Yep, it's true. There are "secret" commands in almost all versions of DOS.
Unlike those found in quite a few Windows programs, these are -useful-
commands, and it a sure sign of some serious incompetence on the part of
the technical writers for no less than -three- different DOS suppliers that
the last few releases of DOS have several of these undocumented commands.

Over the years I've taken notes on these "secret" commands, and while it's
possible I missed a few, here's the most complete list I've got to date:

- Using ATTRIB to hide directories
- COMMAND /F
- COMMAND /P
- COMMAND /D
- COPY. A:
- DIR,
- DOS?=HIGH
- ECHO OFF and ECHO ON
- FDISK /MBR
- FDISK /STATUS
- FOR %%V IN (/SOMETHING)
- FORMAT /AUTOTEST
- FORMAT /BACKUP
- FORMAT /SELECT
- FORMAT /SELECT /U
- FORMAT /H
- IF EXIST <dirname>\NUL <command> and IF EXIST EMMXXXX0 <command>
- INSTALLHIGH
- REM in lines with pipes or redirection
- SHELL=C:\COMMAND.COM /P /F
- SWITCHES=/W
- TRUENAME
- VER /R
- Using : for comments in DOS batch file
- Delimiter characters

─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Using ATTRIB to hide directories
────────────────────────────────

The DOS 5.0 and 6.0 ATTRIB command can do the same thing for directories as it
can for files:  ATTRIB +H <dirname>  will hide the named directory.

─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

SHELL=C:\COMMAND.COM /P /F
──────────────────────────
The /F in the CONFIG.SYS SHELL= statement forces a "Fail" response to all
"Abort, Retry, Fail" prompts issued by the DOS critical error handler.


COMMAND /F
──────────

Entered on the command line, COMMAND /F makes all those annoying "Abort,
Retry, Ignore, Fail" disk error messages default to "Fail" from then on until
rebooting.


COMMAND /P
──────────

For DOS 3.30 (not checked with other versions):  Docs say that this doesn't
allow you to exit back to the previous shell, but /P also forces AUTOEXEC.BAT
to be run on secondary shells.


COMMAND /D
──────────

When used with a primary shell, or secondary with /P, prevents execution of
AUTOEXEC.BAT.

─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

COPY. A:
────────

The use of a period IMMEDIATELY after some DOS statements will work just like
*.*

     Examples:  DEL.     (erase all files in current directory)
                COPY. A:  (copy all files in current directory to A:)

There may be more statements with which it works.

This is actually a documented although obscure feature, though the ability to
use the period with COPY is not documented. What is documented is the fact
that "." and ".." can be used to represent the current and parent directories
respectively, and these will work with many applications which can handle
directory names as arguments. In this case the "." could also be viewed as a
replacement for "*.*"

─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

DIR,
────

Using a comma immediately after DIR shows ALL files, including the HIDDEN
ones.

This appears only to work with DOS 5.0 and 6.0. With 3.30, it doesn't display
either IO.SYS, MSDOS.SYS (both with S, H and R attribs) or a test file with A
and H attribs.

With DOS 5.0, it displayed a test file with H and A, but would not display
IO.SYS or MSDOS.SYS with S, H and R. This isn't surprising actually, since S
alone (without H) will prevent inclusion of a file in a normal DIR.

Not tested with DOS 4.x. Not supported by JP Software's 4DOS.

─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

DOS?=HIGH
─────────

DOS?=HIGH in CONFIG.SYS with DOS 6.0 will prompt you whether to load the DOS
kernel high (into the HMA) or not.

─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

ECHO OFF and ECHO ON
────────────────────

Entering ECHO OFF from the command line erases the prompt and leaves just a
cursor on the screen. ECHO ON from the command line restores the prompt.
This works with all version of DOS.

One of the most frequently asked questions is "How do I ECHO a blank line in
a batch file?"  The most common answer is to use ECHO directly followed by a
period:  ECHO. like so. However, just about any "white space" character will
work, as well as any "delimiter". The following alternatives can be used:
ECHO. ECHO"  ECHO,  ECHO:  ECHO;  ECHO[  ECHO]  etc. Apparently it's just
the way that the command handles the delimiter and has been available from way
back!  Microsoft just began mentioning it in the documentation recently,
though, and their examples use a period.

─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

FDISK /STATUS
─────────────

Prints a screen just like using option 4 of FDISK, "Partition information",
but includes extended partition information. Nice if you want to get an
overview without fear of pressing the wrong keys.

Doesn't work in DOS 3.30.


FDISK /MBR
──────────

MS-DOS 5.0 FDISK has an undocumented parameter, /MBR, that causes it to write
the master boot record to the hard disk without altering the partition table
information. While this feature is not documented, it can be told to
customers on a need-to-know basis.

Warning:  Writing the master boot record to the hard disk in this manner can
make certain hard disks partitioned with SpeedStor unusable. It can also
cause problems for some dual-boot programs, or for disks with more than 4
partitions. Specific information is below.


What is the MBR, anyway?

At the end of the ROM BIOS bootstrap routine, the BIOS will read and execute
the first physical sector of the first floppy or hard drive on the system.
This first sector of the hard disk is called the master boot record, or
sometimes the partition table or master boot block. At the beginning of this
sector of the hard disk is a small program. At the end of this sector is where
the partition information, or partition table, is stored. This program uses
the partition information to determine which partition is bootable (usually
the first primary DOS partition) and attempts to boot from it.

This program is what is written to the disk by FDISK /MBR and is usually
called the master boot record. During normal operation, FDISK only writes
this program to the disk if there is no master boot record.


Why is the MBR changed during Setup?

During installation of Microsoft MS-DOS 5 Upgrade, Setup will replace the
master boot record on the hard disk with code to display the message:

        The MS-DOS 5.0 Setup was not completed.
        Insert the UNINSTALL #1 diskette in drive A.
        Press the ENTER key to continue.

This message should be erased and the master boot code rewritten before Setup
is completed. If a problem occurs during Setup and you return to the previous
MS-DOS, UNINSTAL should also remove this message. However, should Setup or
UNINSTAL fail to remove this message, or should the master boot record become
corrupted, a new master boot record can be written to the disk using the
following command:

         C:\>FDISK /MBR