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==================================================== tm S Y S L O G System Log Utility User's Manual by R W Cobb Version 1.1 PC/MS-DOS 2.0 or Greater (C) Copyright 1984 by R W Cobb, All Rights Reserved ==================================================== L I C E N S E A G R E E M E N T __________________ SYSLOG is published by Apex Resource, 23 Christine Court, Stormville, NY 12582. A limited license is granted to all users of this program to make copies of this program and accompanying documentation and distribute them to other users on the following conditions: 1. No fee or other consideration is to be charged for copying or distributing the program without the express written permission of Apex Resource. 2. The program and its documentation are not to be distributed in modified form. SYSLOG is a trademark of Apex Resource. ____________________________________________________ S Y S L O G ________________________________________ User Supported Software If you are using this program and finding it of value, you are encouraged to register your copy with Apex Resource. Registration of your program entitles you to the following: 1. Production copy of the program, including a program binder, serialized diskette, and manual. 2. Notification of any updates to the program. 3. Free upgrades, when you return your original serialized program diskette with a postage paid return mailer. A one time registration fee of $25.00 (a legitimate tax deductable expense for business users) is all that is required. For your convenience, a registration form is included in Appendix A, and yes we do accept credit cards. Apex Resource also publishes other high quality, low cost software for microcomputers, including: Pascal Programmer's Toolbox - A collection of assembly language procedures and functions that include support for displays, printers, keyboard, strings, and speaker. Print Command - A printer utility for the Epson printers to allow you to create and use new fonts and setup print styles. ____________________________________________________ -1- WHAT IS SYSLOG _____________________________________ Syslog is a utility program which semi-automaticaly logs the usage of computer time. Information logged includes login date/time, operator, project name, and logout date/time. For many years, tax experts have said that computer expenses being deducted at tax time may be challenged in the event of an audit. Since most computer owners have no evidence to prove the actual percentage of computer time used for business purposes, the IRS frequently disallows the deduction. Tax experts agree, however, that the most effective means of substantiating such a claim is a log. For some people, this sensible advice would be reason enough to start a log immediately. Unfortunately, most of us are not endowed with that much discipline. Well then, for the rest of us there is now an even better reason. On July 18, 1984 a new tax law went into effect. The Deficit Reduction Act of 1984 states in one of its provisions that personal property used less than 50% for business purposes is subject to a new restriction. A log of the properties business uses must be maintained. Syslog provides the log you will need to support your tax deduction, and does so in a relatively unobtrusive way. Since your computer will keep accurate date and time data, all you need to provide for the log is the operators initials and a description of what project is being done. For your information, Syslog was written in MS-Pascal ver 3.2, and was compiled to run under MS-DOS 2.0 or greater OS's. A new version of this program is currently 'under construction' and is being written in 'C'. The improvements are aimed at reducing the size of the program, as well as adding some new features. ____________________________________________________ -2- SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS ________________________________ The following configuration is the minimum which is required to access all of the features of Syslog. Minimum Configuration --------------------- o IBM PC/jr/XT/AT or Compatible w/128K o Disk Drive, Double Sided Prefered o Monochrome or Color Display o Printer o PC/MS-DOS 2.0 or greater It is recommended that the following optional equipment be available to improve program performance. Optional Equipment ------------------ o Clock/Calendar Card w/software to set date/time Although we have not tried to run Syslog on any non-IBM equipment, you should be able to do so with no trouble. Syslog is dependent only upon the DOS interface to the computer for all hardware access. This makes the program somewhat hardware independent. Syslog must be run under DOS 2.0 or greater operating systems. Any attempt to run under earlier versions of DOS result in the error message 'Incorrect DOS Version'. The program uses the system date and time to stamp the entries in real time as they are entered. Therefore, it is important that the date and time are correctly set when the computer is first turned on. For this reason it is highly recommended that a clock/calendar card be installed and used to set the date/time when the computer is started. -3- Syslog expects to find the log file, SYSyy.LOG (where yy is the current year), in the root directory, although the program itself may reside in any directory. When the New Log option is used to create a new log, Syslog will put the log in the root directory of the default drive. If you need further explanation of the DOS root and sub directories, see your MS-DOS manual for a complete discussion of the topic. ____________________________________________________ -4- USING SYSLOG _______________________________________ o Getting Started In order to use Syslog you will first need to copy the file 'SYSLOG.EXE' onto your boot disk. Do this with the DOS COPY command. o Entering Parameters Syslog commands are entered as parameters. Parameters are specified at the DOS prompt when the program is executed. This method should be familiar since many DOS commands work in the same way. Upper or lower case letters may be used to enter parameters. Only one parameter may be used per invocation of the the program; multiple parameters are not supported. Some parameters also accept time and date qualifiers to further limit their response. Either '-' or '/' may be used as separators in entering dates (ex. 1-1-84 or 7/4/84). When entering time data you must use military time and ':' must be used to separate the numbers. Only hours and minutes are entered (ex. 7:45 or 17:00); seconds are not used in any entries. Military time is very easy to use once you get the hang of it. For any time after noon, simply add 12 to the hour. Appendix B contains a complete list of available parameters. Note: Syslog looks for the log file each time it is run. If the file is not found, the error message 'System Log File Not Found' is displayed. o Setting up a Log - /N Before you can begin logging entries with Syslog you will need to set up a new log file. At the DOS prompt type: 'SYSLOG/N [Return]'. Note: The log file name is 'built' using the current year. Therefore, at the start of each year you will need to start a new log. -5- You will then be prompted for the serial number of the computer. The serial number can be found on the back panel of the system unit or on the shipping container for the system unit. Enter this number and press [Return]. A new log file will now be created in the root directory of the default disk drive. The file will appear in the disk directory as 'SYSyy.LOG' (yy is the current year). WARNING: If the /N option is selected and a log file is found to exist already, you will be warned that continuing will permanently erase the existing log. Use caution, and be sure of what you are doing! o Making Log Entries - /I, /O There are two ways to make log entries, the first of which is to login. Login (/I) is used to create a new entry in the log. The second way to make a log entry is to logout. Logout (/O) is used to close an existing entry. In order to visualize what happens, it is useful to understand what the log contains. The log is maintained with six pieces of information in a completed entry: Date-In, Time-In, Operator, Project, Date-Out, and Time-Out. Whenever a login is performed, the first four items are filled in. The computer will supply the date-in and time-in, while you are required to enter the operator and project. The date-out and time-out are left blank. Log entries which do not yet have the date-out and time-out completed are called OPEN entries. An open entry is always the result of a successful login. Whenever a logout is performed, the date-out and time-out information is completed. Once the date-out and time-out are entered, the entry is CLOSED. A closed entry is always the result of a successful logout. -6- You are now ready to login; at the DOS prompt type: 'SYSLOG/I [Return]'. At the 'Oper :' prompt, enter the operators initials and press [Return]. A maximum of three characters may be entered for the operator; longer entries are truncated. Next you will be prompted to enter a description of the project. At the 'Project :' prompt you may enter up to sixteen characters and then press [Return]. Again, longer entries will be truncated. Having now completed a login, you now have three ways available to close the open entry just created. 1. Logout the entry using the current date and time. Type 'SYSLOG/O [Return]' at the DOS prompt. 2. Logout the entry using a specified date and time. Type 'SYSLOG/O hh:mm mm-dd-yy [Return]', substituting the closing time and date that you need. The time may be specified alone and in that case the current date will be used. If the time and date supplied precede the login date and time an error results. 3. Logout the entry and then login a new entry. Type 'SYSLOG/I [Return]' at the DOS prompt. You will be prompted for the closing date and time of the open entry before the new entry is created. o Display Last Entry - /L Sometimes you will want to look at the last entry in the log. The /L parameter displays the last log entry on your display screen along with other information about the log such as date started, number of entries, status of last entry, and computer serial number. At the DOS prompt type: 'SYSLOG/L [Return]'. o Printing the Log - /P Printing the log is an essential feature. If you can't show your log to anyone, it won't be of much use to you. The /P parameter allows you to print the current log or a log from any other year. You may also specify the date from which printing will commence. -7- To print the entire contents of this year's log, the /P parameter is used alone. At the DOS prompt type: 'SYSLOG/P [Return]'. If you are interested in only printing a part of the log, you can specify a date with the /P parameter and Syslog will begin printing from that date forward. If, for example, you wanted to print the log entries for the second half of 1984 you would enter: 'SYSLOG/P 7-1-84 [Return]'. The same technique of specifying a date is used to print a log from another year. If you wanted to print the entire 1983 log (assuming, of course, that the 1983 log file is located in the root directory) you would enter: 'SYSLOG/P 1-1-83 [Return]'. Terminate a long printout at any time by pressing [Ctrl]-[Break]. o Erase Last Entry - /E Occasionally it may be neccessary to erase an entry which has been made incorrectly. The /E parameter has been provided for this purpose. Erased entries are not actually removed from the log. The project name is simply changed to read 'ERASED', and the number of entries counter is decremented. When the log is printed, the erased entry will show up on the list until a new entry is created to replace the erased entry. At the DOS prompt type: 'SYSLOG/E [Return]'. Use of this feature should be limited due to the fact that corruption of the log will make its use as a reliable tax document subject to serious question. WARNING: The /E option will permanently erase the last entry. You will be warned of this and given the opportunity to stop. Use caution, and be sure of what you are doing! -8- o Suggestions In actual use the program should be 'forced' upon the computer user to insure that entries are made in real time. The best way to accomplish this is to include the statement 'SYSLOG/I' in an autoexec.bat file on the boot disk. This technique will force a login and allow the logout of an open entry if one is found. If you are using any software to set the system clock with a clock card, make sure that Syslog is run AFTER the time and date have been correctly set. If you do not have a clock card, include the two DOS commands, DATE and TIME, in your autoexec.bat file. DOS will not prompt you for the date and time when an autoexec.bat fill is used. Log entries use 48 bytes each in disk storage space. At 350 entries per year, this amounts to a log file which will reach about 17K bytes over the course of a year. This is not a very large file; however, it may exceed the available space on the DOS Disk if you are using a single sided disk drive. One way to avoid this problem is to create a 'boot disk' which you can always use to start up your computer. This would be a disk that contained only those files needed at boot time, such as software to set the system clock, electronic disks, print spoolers, screen saver, etc. (and DOS, of course). If you have any suggestions for improvements to Syslog which would make it more useful, they will be gratefuly received. APEX RESOURCE 23 Christine Court Stormville, NY 12582 (914) 221-2611 ____________________________________________________ Appendix A PRODUCT REGISTRATION FORM __________________________ APEX RESOURCE SYSLOG 23 Christine Court V1.1 Stormville, NY 12582 (914) 221-2611 011485 ____________________________________________________ My $25.00 is enclosed (NY Residents add $1.25 sales tax). Add me to the list of registered SYSLOG users and send me a production copy of the program, including: program binder, diskette, and manual. I understand that registration also entitles me to notification of future updates to the program as well as free upgrades if I send in the original serialized program diskette with a postage paid return mailer. Oh!... I almost forgot... Please Hurry!! Shipping Information (Most orders shipped in 48 hrs) Name ____________________________________________ Company ____________________________________________ Address ____________________________________________ City ____________________________________________ State _______________________ Zip ______________ Phone ____________________________________________ Payment Information Check/Money Order ____ Master Card ____ VISA ____ Credit Card Number _________________________________ Credit Card Expiration Date ________________________ Signature(if charging) _____________________________ Appendix B SYSLOG Parameters __________________________________ /P [date] - Print the contents of the log. If a date is supplied in the form mm-dd-yy, all entries from that date to the present will be printed. If a date is specified, then the year given will be used to select the log file. /I - Make Log Entry. The current date/time are used for the new entry. If a prior entry is open, the user is prompted for the closing time/date and the entry is closed before a new entry is started. /O [time[date]] - Close Log Entry. If a time/date is supplied, then it will be used to close the entry otherwise the current date and time are used. /L - List Last Entry. /E - Erase Last Entry. /N - Start New Log. ____________________________________________________