DP Tool Club 8

home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search

/ DP Tool Club 8 / CDASC08.ISO / VRAC / DOSUTL21.ZIP / DOSUTIL.DOC < prev next >

Wrap

Text File | 1993-08-22 | 24.2 KB | 671 lines

DIRECTORY COMMANDER PLUS ======================== Version 2.0 Copyright 1991-1993 by Chuck Steenburgh & Tay-Jee Software _______ ____|__ | (TM) --| | |------------------- | ____|__ | Association of | | |_| Shareware |__| o | Professionals -----| | |--------------------- |___|___| MEMBER DOS Version 6.00 adds many new features to the venerable dir[ectory] command. What makes these new options even more useful is the addition of the environment variable DIRCMD. By using DIRCMD, you can store your favorite switches for the dir command in the environment so you don't have to keep typing them on the command line. The problem, of course, is that these switches are still just as cryptic as ever. For example, the command: dir /og means to show all files with subdirectories grouped before the files. Makes sense, doesn't it? That's what we said. We wrote DIRECTORY COMMANDER to make life a little easier for myself. Instead of requiring you to spend 10 minutes look- ing through your DOS 6.00 manual to remember what all those switches are so you can compose a SET DIRCMD= line, DIRECTORY COMMANDER will guide you through the process of selecting your desired options from a simple, menu-driven display. DIRECTORY COMMANDER will then create a small batch file containing the options you have selected. Just execute this batch file, and your preferences will be saved to the environment. Material that differs from the documentation for the prev- ious version is set off by vertical lines in the margin. STARTING DIRECTORY COMMANDER Starting DIRECTORY COMMANDER couldn't be easier. Simply type DCPLUS at the command line. You will see a small box containing the words "DIRCMDr PLUS" at the top of the screen, and two larger boxes below. Page 1 The box on the left (surrounded by double lines) contains the Directory Options menu. Select these options by pressing the first letter in the option name (highlighted in blue on color displays). Pressing the first letter will toggle an "X" off and on next to the option. "X" means that option is currently selected. [ ] Pause when full This activates the /p switch. When the screen fills, you will be asked by DOS to press any key to continue. [ ] Wide format This activates the /w switch. Filenames only will be displayed in five columns across the screen. Has no effect if the "File names only" option is selected. [ ] Subdirectories This activates the /s switch. In addition to the cur- rent directory, all subdirectories beneath it will be included. [ ] File names only This will eliminate all of the "extraneous" information from the listing, producing only a list of filenames (in the format FILENAME.EXT) with no headers or footers. Activates the /b switch. [ ] Lowercase only This activates the /l switch. All file and directory names will be displayed in lower case. [ ] Compression ratio | This actives the /c[h] switch, which displays the compres- | sion ratio for DoubleSpace compressed drives. When selec- | ting this option, you will be asked whether you want to | use the host drive's cluster size. Since DoubleSpace (and | most other compression programs) use a misleadingly large | cluster size, which reports an exaggerated compressio ra- | tio, we suggest answering "Y" to this prompt. | [ ] DIRCMD Set When activated, this option will cause DIRECTORY COMMANDER to set a master environment variable named DIRCMD with the options you have selected. These options will then be in effect automatically whenever the DIR command is used from DOS. Page 2 The box on the right side of the screen (initially sur- rounded by single lines) contains what two "special options." These are the /a (attribute) and /o (order of sort) switches. This large box is divided into two smaller boxes, one for each of these two options. This menu operates a little differently. Like the simple Directory Options, "Attributes" and "Order of Sort" can be selected by pressing the first letter of their names (high- lighted in blue). Initially, both options are turned off (no "X" displayed next to option name). When you press the "a" or "o" key for the first time, you will activate that option AND the Special Options menu. Note that single lines will now appear around the Directory Options Menu and double lines will appear around the appropriate portion of the Special Options menu. When the Special Options menu is active, you can select additional options. These options appear below the words "Attributes" and "Order of Sort." When you select either "a" or "o", the corresponding set of special options becomes active (first letter is highlighted in green). These options are described below: Attributes Special Options: Hidden (displays hidden files) System (displays system files) Directories (displays only subdirectories) Archive (displays files needing backup) Read Only (displays read only files) Order of Sort Special Options: Name (sorts by file name from a-z) Extension (sorts by extension from a-z) Date & Time (sorts by date & time, earliest to latest) Size (sorts by size, smallest to largest) Files First (displays all files before subdirectories) Compression (displays files from least to most compressed) | When you select one of the special options, a plus sign (+) appears in front of that option. This turns it on. Selecting the special option a second time puts a minus sign (-) in front of the option. This activates the option "in reverse." For the atttribute options, all files which DO NOT possess this attribute will be displayed. For order of sort options, the sort order will be reversed. Selecting the option a third time will toggle it off. For the Order of Sort options menu, the order in which you select options is important. This is the order in which Page 3 those options will appear on the command line. For example, let's say that you want to have all directories listed first (alphabetically), then all files listed (alphabetically). To select this option, you would first press "o" (for Order of Sort) from the Directory Options menu. The Special Options menu for Order of Sort will activate. Then press "f" twice (two "reverse" the files first option). A minus (-) sign and the numeral "1" should appear next to the "Files first" option. Next, press "n" for "Name" option. A plus (+) sign and the numeral "2" should appear to the left of the "Name" option. When the SET DIRCMD= string is written, it will appear as "/ogn". As long as the Special Options menu is active, you can toggle on/reversed/off as many of the appropriate special options as you want. When you are finished, press ESC and the Directory Options Menu will be reactivated. If you press "a" or "o" a second time from the Directory Options menu, that option (and any of the associated options such as (N)ame, (S)ize, etc.) will be turned off. When you are done selecting options, and the Directory Options menu is active (surrounded by double lines), press ESC to exit. A message will appear in the lower left hand corner displaying the SET DIRCMD= string which you have created. HELP Pressing F1 from any portion of the program will call up a window displaying context-sensitive help. There is a sepa- rate, two-part help display for each of the three menus. Page 4 FORMCMDr ======== Version 2.1 Copyright 1992-1993 by Chuck Steenburgh & Tay-Jee Software _______ ____|__ | (TM) --| | |------------------- | ____|__ | Association of | | |_| Shareware |__| o | Professionals -----| | |--------------------- |___|___| MEMBER DOS' FORMAT command is one of the most essential of all. Unfortunately, it can also be one of the most daunting (not to mention dangerous) for new users. Although DOS 6.00 has made the command somewhat easier by eliminating confusing references to tracks and sectors on the command line, newer wrinkles were introduced with the addition of "QuickFormatting" and the un- conditional format. It is still far too easy to make mistakes. FORMCMDr does for FORMAT what DIRCMDr Plus does for DIR: it provides a menu-driven interface for selecting the various formatting options. With a little help from the DOSKEY program and a batch file, we are able to provide support for an environ- ment variable, called FORMCMD, to specify default options. GETTING STARTED To run the FORMCMDr program, type: FCDR on the command line and press {Return}. (See the end of the documentation for instructions on an alternate method of launch- ing the program.) You will see a three-part display on your screen. In the upper left portion of the screen is the program menu. It contains a list of 10 options. Specific menu items can be selected through the use of a hotkey or a scrolling cursor bar. The upper right hand corner of the screen contains the "Status Board." This displays the status of each of the options which you can select via FORMCMDr. The lower portion of the screen displays the options current- Page 5 ly stored in the FORMCMD environment variable. SELECTING A MENU OPTION Menu options can be selected by pressing the first letter of that option (the "hotkey," highlighted on the menu) or by posi- tioning the scrolling bar over that item and pressing {Return}. The meaning of each menu item is described below. Disk Size Use this option to specify the size of the disk to be format- ted. Upon choosing this item, a second menu will appear listing the four most common disk sizes. To specify one of the more uncommon disk sizes, such as a single-sided disk or the new 2.88 megabyte floppies, select "Weird Disk Sizes," then the proper disk size from another menu. The default disk size is that of the largest size disk that | can be formatted in drive A (the default drive), if the size can| be determined. | It is alright in some cases to NOT specify a disk size. In this case, the drive will usually format disks to the largest size supported by the drive in question. Target Drive You must always specify a drive letter to format. The de- fault drive for FORMCMDr is drive A. After selecting this menu option, enter the letter of the drive you wish to format. If FORMCMDr can recognize the drive type, it will automatic- | ally set the disk size, or present you with a menu of possible | choices if the drive supports multiple disk sizes. | Volume Label Select this menu item to include a volume label on your disk. You can enter a label of up to 11 characters. Use volume labels to identify your disks, especially important ones that you might not be able to identify from the files they contain. Quick Format A quick format does not actually reformat a disk; it essen- tially does little more than erase the disk. Obviously, for this to work, the disk must have been previously formatted; you must also format the disk to the same size to which it was orig- inally formatted. A quick format is much, much faster than a normal format, but since it does not actually format the disk, it is less reliable than a true format. Page 6 Quick formatting works on standard DOS formatted disks; it also works on some disks formatted by non-standard formatting programs such as Maxi-Disk. Unconditional Format DOS 6.00 provides the capability of unformatting disks. When a disk is reformatted, DOS normally saves certain information needed to unformat the diskette during the reformatting process. This adds several seconds to the formatting time. To forego this feature and speed up the formatting of your disks, select this option. System Disk A system disk contains the operating system files and the command processor and can be used to boot your system. A system disk takes a few seconds longer to format (time to copy the system files) and will have approximately 110k less space avail- able than a normal disk. Select this option to create a system disk. Since a system disk cannot be unformatted, it is usually a good idea to specify an unconditional format also. WarpFormat (DANGER) DOS 6.00 provides several undocumented switches to allow immediate formatting of a disk without prompts or warnings. This can be very dangerous! The /AUTOTEST switch, which is used by FORMCMDr to accomplish immediate formatting, will IGNORE the usual security features designed to prevent you from formatting your hard disk. While this provides a convenient way to quickly format a disk, it should be used sparingly and should NOT be set to the environment! FORMCMD Set This option causes your selected options to be saved to a master environment variable named FORMCMD. All options except for WarpFormat and Volume Label will be saved. Go For It! This command will execute FORMAT with the options selected and displayed on the Status Board (NOT in the environment dis- play at the bottom of the screen). Abort This will exit the program without executing FORMAT. If you have specified FORMCMD Set, the environment variable WILL be set. THE STATUS BOARD Page 7 The Status Board reflects the options currently selected by you. When the program is started normally, all of the options will be blank except for two: the Target Drive will be listed as drive A and "Safe Format" will be selected. If the FORMCMD variable is set when the program is started, these settings will be reflected on the Status Board initially. Target Drive, Disk Size, and Volume Label will all correspond to the values you have selected/input from the menu. The other options are toggled "on" or "off" through the menu. An option is "on" when a check mark appears next to it on the Status Board. "Safe Format" is initially toggled on. Selecting "Uncon- ditional" from the menu will toggle it off. As mentioned above, a system disk cannot be unformatted, so these options are incompatible with one another. Likewise, QuickFormat and WarpFormat are incompatible. WarpFormat does not support volume labeling; although you may enter a volume label if WarpFormat is selected, it will be ignored if WarpFor- mat is still active when the F10 key is pressed. USING THE BATCH FILE FMT.BAT The file FMT.BAT is supplied as a convenient means of acces- sing the FORMCMD variable created by the program. To perform a format using the default options specified in the FORMCMD var- iable, use the following syntax: FMT d: where d: is the letter of the drive you wish to format (usually A: or B:). If you like, you can redefine DOS' FORMAT command to corres- pond to FMT.BAT through the use of the following DOSKEY macro: DOSKEY format=fmt.bat $* This DOSKEY macro can be implemented by typing the command above or by executing the file FMAC.BAT in the distribution archive. If you have used DOSKEY to redefine your FORMAT command, you may from time to time wish to format disks using something OTHER than the options defined in the FORMCMD variable. In this case, you have one of two options. You can type a space before typing the word "format" on the command line, adding your options such as drive specifier and switches; OR you can type "format x" fol- lowed by options such as drive specifier and switches. The first method will simply bypass the DOSKEY macro definition al- Page 8 together; the latter method relies on features within FMT.BAT to ignore the FORMCMD variable. Page 9 OMBUDSMAN These programs are produced by a member of the Association of Shareware Professionals (ASP). ASP wants to make sure that the shareware principle works for you. If you are unable to resolve a shareware-related problem with an ASP member by contacting the member directly, ASP may be able to help. The ASP Ombudsman can help you resolve a dispute or problem with an ASP member, but does not provide technical support for members' products. Please write to the ASP Ombudsman at 545 Grover Road, Muskegon, MI 49442 or send a CompuServe message via CompuServe Mail to ASP Ombudsman, 70007,3536. DISCLAIMER The programs described in this documentation are guaran- teed to do absolutely nothing! They have, however, in my exper- ience performed essentially as described herein. The author will not be responsible for any loss or damages caused through the use of these programs. No warranty, express or implied, is provided for this software's performance, merchantability, or fitness for a particular purpose. All trademarks are property of their respective owners. The programs and documentation are Copyright 1991-1993 by Chuck Steenburgh and Tay-Jee Software. You are encouraged to distribute the UNREGISTERED VERSIONS of these programs provided the conditions specified in the file VENDOR.DOC are met. You may evaluate this software for up to 30 days on a free trial basis. After 30 days, you should register your use of the programs. The registration fee is $14.95, payable to Tay- Jee Software at the address given below. Registration includes both programs in the 6th Sense utility set. Registration has the following advantages: - Registration includes a collection of DOSKEY macros: dozens of tricks, shortcuts, and handy additions to your DOS com- mand set. - We are improving these programs all the time. Registration will get you IMMEDIATELY a disk with the latest version, and automatic notice of future upgrades. - While we can't promise to include everyone's suggestions in program updates, you can bet we'll listen to registered users before any of you scrounges out there. - You will also get an evaluation copy of our text file for- matting program (used to produce the margins in this doc- Page 10 ument), and any other electronic creations we have decided to unleash on a foolish, unsuspecting world. This includes our best-selling STEENBURGH's STUFF, 21 utility programs for use in batch files; and Back Soon!, a message-taking utility. Send comments/registrations to: Tay-Jee Software Post Office Box 835 Lexington, VA 24450 (703)261-7023 !!!VIRGINIA RESIDENTS ADD 4.5SALES TAX!!! ($0.68) International orders add $5 for shipping. CIS 72330,1776 (IBMSYS and IBMPRO forums) You may also register on-line on CompuServe. GO SWREG; the registration number is 1175. Page 11