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4DOS Application Notes Version 4.0 -- November 1, 1991 Copyright 1988 - 1991, JP Software Inc., All Rights Reserved. Published by JP Software Inc., P.O. Box 1470, E. Arlington, MA 02174 USA, (617) 646-3975. This file provides information on using 4DOS with a variety of other software products. It is intended for use whenever you have a question about using another product with 4DOS, or suspect a compatibility problem. Inclusion of a product in this file does NOT mean there are compatibili- ty problems with it! It only indicates that we have some information that may be useful to you when you use the product with 4DOS. This file is formatted at 58 lines per page, and contains form feeds and page footers. It can be viewed with a file viewer such as the 4DOS LIST command, or printed on most PC printers using the command: copy appnotes.doc prn Printing it with a program that formats the pages is not likely to work due to the formatting included in the file. Our customers regularly ask us for recommendations on software to use with 4DOS. While we can't tell you what is best for your use or your system, at the end of this file we have included some comments on soft- ware we like and have found useful on our own systems here at JP Software. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 1 Table of Contents Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 General Information . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Running 4DOS along with COMMAND.COM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Executing DOS Commands via Interrupt 2E . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Swapping to RAM Disks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 4DOS and Other Command Line Editing Programs . . . . . . . . . . 6 4DOS and EXE File Compression Programs . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Mouse Compatibility with 4DOS HELP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Information on Specific Products . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 MS-DOS APPEND Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 MS-DOS DATE and TIME Commands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 MS-DOS FASTOPEN Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 MS-DOS 4.0 and 5.0 FORMAT /S Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 MS-DOS 4.0+ SELECT Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 1DIR+ (Bourbaki) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 ANSI.SYS (various manufacturers) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 Bookshelf CD-ROM (Microsoft) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 DESQView (Quarterdeck) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 DR-DOS (Digital Research) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 Epsilon (Lugaru Software) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 GeoWorks Ensemble (GEOS) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Hijaak (Inset Systems) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 LOGIMENU (Logitech) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Manifest (Quarterdeck) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 MOVE-EM (Qualitas) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Netware (Novell) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 Novell MENU (Novell) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 OS/2 1.3 and 2.0 (IBM) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 PC Tools (Central Point Software) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 Personal REXX (Quercus Systems) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 QEMM and QRAM (Quarterdeck) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 SigmaPlot (Sigma Designs) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 Software Carousel (SoftLogic Solutions) . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 TSRCOM Utilities (TurboPower Software) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 UltraVision (Personics) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Ventura Publisher (Xerox) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Windows 3.0 (Microsoft) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 Programs Requiring PATH to be Under 128 Characters . . . . . . . 22 Computer Select CD-ROM Database (Ziff-Davis) (23) RenderMan (AutoDesk) (23) VINES Network (Banyan) (23) Windows 3.0 (Microsoft) (23) Software For Use With 4DOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 2 Introduction ------------ We have made every effort to ensure that this file is as accurate and up to date as possible. Our information is based on our own investiga- tions, reports from 4DOS beta testers, technical support calls, discus- sions with manufacturers of other products, and reports from our custom- ers. Unfortunately, varying conditions between systems or between software releases can easily invalidate the results of previous tests. Therefore we cannot guarantee that every item in this file is accurate for all systems or will remain accurate over time; you may have to do your own testing to determine what works well on your system with the software you own. If you have a question or problem related to another program, first read through chapter 7 of the 4DOS manual ("Using 4DOS With Your Hardware And Software"). Chapter 7 gives general suggestions for using 4DOS with other products and for solving compatibility problems, and should always be used along with this file. If the information in Chapter 7 doesn't help, check below for both additional general suggestions which pertain to your question, and information on the specific product you are working with. Please note that some products are listed by category rather than or in addition to specific listings by product name; check the Table of Contents carefully to see where any particular product may be covered. Many of the items below refer to the 4DOS.INI file. See chapter 6 of the manual for a complete explanation of 4DOS.INI and the directives which can be used there. If you have a printed manual, also check MANMOD.DOC for directives which were added or modified since the manual went to press. Virtually all of your software will work with 4DOS with no trouble. If you do find an interaction or compatibility problem, it can probably be diagnosed easily with one of three methods: checking this file for specific information; trying different 4DOS swapping methods; and test- ing for interactions by removing all drivers and TSRs which are not absolutely necessary and then replacing them one at a time. These methods and other related techniques are described in Chapter 7 of the manual. Many popular software products are not covered in this file. If a program does not appear here, it simply means that as far as we know no additional information is necessary or useful when using that program with 4DOS. If you have a question or problem related to how 4DOS works with other hardware or software products, and it isn't addressed in chapter 7 or by these notes, contact JP Software or your dealer for technical support. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 3 General Information ------------------- Running 4DOS along with COMMAND.COM: You may find a very rare program which will not work under 4DOS, but runs properly under COMMAND.COM. If you have determined that the problem cannot be solved through configuration changes or by eliminating or reconfiguring a third program which is causing the problem, use this section to see how to run 4DOS and COMMAND.COM together in order to diagnose such a problem. There are two methods of loading COMMAND.COM before another pro- gram. The first is to load it only when a specific program is running. This can be accomplished with the following command (assuming COMMAND.COM is in the root directory of drive C:): c:\command /c progname options where "progname" is the program name (with path if necessary) and "options" are any parameters for the program. This command will run COMMAND.COM, load and run the program, and upon exit from the program will exit from COMMAND.COM and return to 4DOS. If this is necessary to run a specific program, it can be defined as an alias: alias progname `c:\command /c progname %&` The "%&" passes all command line arguments on to the program. With this method, if the program is large COMMAND.COM may need to reload itself when the program exits. It will not be able to do so unless the COMSPEC is set properly. If you experience prob- lems such as "Invalid COMMAND.COM" errors when using this method, use a batch file like the following to run the program in ques- tion (the SETLOCAL and ENDLOCAL cause COMSPEC to be restored to its previous value after the program exits). You will need to modify this file if your copy of COMMAND.COM is not stored in the C:\ directory: setlocal set comspec=C:\COMMAND.COM c:\command /c progname %& endlocal The second method is more drastic: you can start your system under COMMAND.COM, then run 4DOS. This approach is rarely neces- sary, and will use about 4 - 5K of additional RAM for the resi- dent portion of COMMAND.COM. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 4 The following steps will set your system up to boot with COMMAND.COM, and run 4DOS automatically as part of the boot pro- cess: (1) Set up the SHELL= statement in CONFIG.SYS to run COMMAND.COM, or leave it out entirely. In other words, set it up just as you would if 4DOS were not on your system. (2) Separate your AUTOEXEC file into two parts: part 1, which remains in AUTOEXEC.BAT, should contain any commands you wish to have COMMAND.COM execute before 4DOS is started. This might include loading any TSRs which you cannot get to load properly under 4DOS. Part 2, which you must place in a separate batch file (we suggest the name 4DAUTO.BAT, but you can use any name with a .BAT or .BTM extension), should con- tain the commands you wish to have 4DOS execute when it is started. (3) Place the following line as the last line in the modified AUTOEXEC.BAT: 4DOS parameters filename where "parameters" represents the appropriate 4DOS parameters for swapping, environment and history size, etc. (see the Installation section of the manual), and "filename" is the name of the new batch file you created for part 2 of your old AUTOEXEC file. Do NOT include a /P in the "parameters" or 4DOS will re-run AUTOEXEC and therefore load itself again, ad infinitum! (4) Be sure that KSTACK.COM is loaded in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file or your 4DOS startup file if you wish to use the 4DOS KEYSTACK command. This will load COMMAND.COM, execute the commands in AUTOEXEC, load 4DOS, execute the commands in your new batch file, and then give you the normal 4DOS prompt. There is one drawback to this second approach: because 4DOS is not loaded with a /P, the EXIT command will return you to COMMAND.COM if you inadvertently enter it at the primary shell prompt. You can get around this by including the /P parameter despite the caution above, and then placing the following line at the start of AUTOEXEC.BAT: if not "%@eval[2+2]"=="4" quit This line tests the 4DOS variable function %@EVAL, which will return "4" under 4DOS and remain on the line unchanged under COMMAND.COM. If %@EVAL does not return a "4" the statement QUITs the batch file, preventing the infinite loop described above. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 5 Executing DOS Commands via Interrupt 2E: COMMAND.COM contains an undocumented feature which allows pro- grams to execute DOS commands by passing the command through software interrupt number 2E (hex). Very few programs use this feature, but full, documented support for it is available within 4DOS for those circumstances where it's needed. If you have a program which is supposed to execute DOS commands and it does not work under 4DOS, first read Chapter 7 of the manual, check your COMSPEC setting, and check that enough memory is available for 4DOS to execute as a secondary shell. If these appear correct, and the program still doesn't work, it may be trying to use INT 2E to execute commands. If you believe this is the case, try setting the FullINT2E direc- tive in 4DOS.INI to Yes: FullINT2E = Yes (see chapter 6 of the manual for more information on 4DOS.INI). Full INT 2E support is normally left disabled because it adds about 100 bytes to the resident size of 4DOS, and it isn't needed in most circumstances. See Appendix C of the ASCII manual, or the MANMOD.DOC file if you have a printed manual, for technical details on the INT 2E inter- face. Swapping to RAM Disks: In order to swap the primary shell to a RAM disk the RAM disk must be completely defined in CONFIG.SYS via a DEVICE= statement (most RAM disks are set up this way). RAM disks completely or partially defined in AUTOEXEC.BAT (such as the RAM disk / cache combination in Multisoft's PC Kwik Power Pak) cannot be used for swapping the primary shell, because AUTOEXEC.BAT has not been executed at the time that the root shell is loaded, and hence the RAM disk does not exist at that point. 4DOS and Other Command Line Editing Programs: Programs such as Anarkey (Moderne Software), PCED (Cove Soft- ware), and ReDOS (Multisoft) will work properly with 4DOS. How- ever these programs require the use of SETDOS /L1 to operate, which will disable 4DOS's command recall and command line edit- ing. In most cases you will be able to switch back and forth between 4DOS editing and the other editor by toggling the SETDOS /L state. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 6 When another editor is used 4DOS's command history will be main- tained, and can be viewed with HISTORY, but will not be available for recall until a SETDOS /L0 is executed. 4DOS aliases, execut- able extensions, and other features will be active regardless of the SETDOS /L state. Aliases will be processed after any pro- cessing done by the other editing program. You must use care with other programs that provide an aliasing capability to avoid confusion if a command is expanded by both the other program and 4DOS! 4DOS and EXE File Compression Programs: If you use a file compression program like PKLITE, LZEXE, or DIET, you must use caution when compressing 4DOS files. You should be able to compress the 4DOS.COM file with no trouble. However if you have a copy of 4DOS that you intend to brand with your name and serial number, you must brand it BEFORE you run the file compression program, or the BRAND program will fail. Simi- larly, HELPCFG will not be able to modify your HELP system colors if you compress the 4HELP.EXE program. The only compressed pro- gram files distributed with 4DOS are HELPCFG.EXE, and 4MAKE.EXE on the 4DOS / 4OS2 Utility Disk; these files are compressed with the PKLite Professional package. Mouse Compatibility with 4DOS HELP: The 4DOS HELP system depends on correct operation of your mouse driver. If your mouse doesn't work in HELP, or you have trouble with mouse "droppings" (characters left behind by the mouse cur- sor), be sure you have the most up to date working version of your mouse driver that is available. Users of Microsoft serial and PS/2 mice may notice a long delay when the HELP system starts. This is due to the long initialization time required for these mice, and is a function of the mouse driver, not the HELP system. If you don't use the mouse in HELP and want to speed up HELP startup, set HelpOptions = /X in 4DOS.INI. This will dis- able all mouse access in the HELP system. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 7 Information on Specific Products -------------------------------- The information below is listed alphabetically by product, with manufac- turers' names included. MS-DOS commands are listed before other soft- ware products. Items marked with two asterisks [**] after the product name were sup- plied by users, and have not been tested by JP Software. MS-DOS APPEND Command: Unlike most other commands in MS-DOS, APPEND has both an external portion and an undocumented internal portion. The first time APPEND is run the external portion is executed, and loaded into memory as a TSR (memory-resident program). Subsequent uses of APPEND to adjust the APPEND path use an undocumented internal interface between COMMAND.COM and the TSR portion of APPEND. 4DOS does not support the internal portion of APPEND command. This means that you cannot change the APPEND path directly from 4DOS. However you can still use APPEND with 4DOS. APPEND should initially be loaded in the usual way, from AUTOEXEC or any other batch file, or from the command line. However to change the APPEND path after APPEND has been loaded for the first time, you must run APPEND from COMMAND.COM, not from 4DOS. To do this, enter the following command (modify the command appropriately if COMMAND.COM is not in the directory C:\): c:\command /c append [new append path list] You could also set up a 4DOS alias to do the above command for you, for example: alias app `c:\command /c append` which would be invoked with the command app [new path list] The /X switch can be used, and it will affect 4DOS directory searches for many 4DOS commands (as it does for COMMAND.COM). Please note that this makes APPEND very dangerous: if you APPEND a directory with /X and then (say) delete *.BAK when no such files exist in the current directory, then the .BAK files in the APPENDed directory will be deleted instead. The APPEND /E switch will not work with 4DOS. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 8 ! CAUTION: In our opinion APPEND is an extremely dangerous com- mand. It is capable of "fooling" programs into thinking they are accessing one file when they are really accessing another one with the same name in a different directory. This can either do just what you want, or cause all sorts of trouble, depending on the circumstances. In particular, this behavior can cause 4DOS to place descriptions which go with files in one directory in the description file for another directory, because with APPEND run- ning 4DOS can't tell whether APPEND has opened a file different from the one it asked for. If you must use APPEND to make certain applications work, we STRONGLY suggest that you set up the aliases described above, and load APPEND in AUTOEXEC.BAT with an empty path. Then, for each application, set up an alias to run it that is similar to the following: alias myprog `app c:\mydata^d:\util\myprog.exe^app ;` This alias sets the APPEND path, runs the application, and clears the APPEND path. When used in this way APPEND is less likely to cause trouble because it is disabled except when it is explicitly needed. In MS-DOS version 4.0 the new APPEND /PATH:OFF switch mitigates this problem somewhat; in particular it will keep 4DOS file de- scription files from getting mixed up between directories. For this reason 4DOS will automatically set this switch if it detects that you are running APPEND and DOS 4.0 or above. MS-DOS DATE and TIME Commands: Most PC systems automatically set the hardware clock date and time (which is maintained while the system is turned off, and is different from the DOS date and time) when the corresponding DOS command is executed. In most such cases the hardware manufactur- er has implemented this capability within the BIOS built into the system. This type of implementation is compatible with 4DOS, and the 4DOS DATE and TIME commands will set the hardware clock prop- erly. A very small number of manufacturers have modified the version COMMAND.COM which they sell with their PCs to perform this func- tion. In these cases, 4DOS's DATE and TIME commands, which do not have such hardware-specific modifications, will not set the hardware clock. If you normally set the hardware clock's date and time with DOS commands, and they don't work under 4DOS, first check your clock's battery! If it's OK, either run a secondary copy of COMMAND.COM to set the date and time, or invoke your system's SETUP or other utility program to do so. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 9 MS-DOS FASTOPEN Command: The MS-DOS FASTOPEN command generally works with 4DOS, but does not properly detect renamed directories, and may have similar problems when directories are removed. This is a problem in FASTOPEN, not in 4DOS. If you use FASTOPEN and rename a direc- tory with the 4DOS REN command, then do a DIR command, you may see the old name and not the new one displayed; you may also occasionally have trouble accessing files under the new name. The only solution we are aware of in this situation is to reboot your system. Our opinion is that, if you have the memory to support it, a disk caching program will provide a much greater and more effective performance improvement than FASTOPEN. MS-DOS 4.0 and 5.0 FORMAT /S Command: The FORMAT /S command in DOS 4 and DOS 5 will copy 4DOS.COM to a newly formatted floppy disk and rename it COMMAND.COM, which may not be what you want and is confusing at best. See the discus- sion of "4DOS and DOS" in Chapter 7 of the manual for more infor- mation on this issue. MS-DOS 4.0+ SELECT Command: In MS-DOS 4.0 and above a SELECT command was introduced. This external command is totally unrelated to the 4DOS internal SELECT command. If you need to use both, you can set up aliases to adjust how the command names are handled. For example, the fol- lowing two aliases set up SELECT to access the DOS 4.0 external SELECT command (assumed to be stored in C:\DOS\SELECT.EXE), and SEL to access the internal 4DOS SELECT command: alias select c:\dos\select.exe alias sel *select 1DIR+ (Bourbaki): The information below was obtained from tests with 1DIR+ version 3.02, and verified with version 3.5 as well. 1DIR+ will work properly under 4DOS in its partially resident or EMS modes when set up as described below. It will work in its fully resident mode but cannot reliably exit back to 4DOS once started. If your copy of 1DIR+ is set up for fully resident mode, you can load it into memory under 4DOS to switch it to partially resident 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 10 or EMS mode. To do so, from the directory where you normally run 1DIR+, type the commands: setdos /l1 1dirplus When 1DIR+ starts go to the "Wonder" / "Setup" menu and switch the mode to partially resident or EMS. Hit Esc to exit, and take the "Exit/Save" option (not "Save/Reset"). Back at the main menu, exit with "Wonder" / "Exit". At this point the system will probably hang. Reboot your computer. You should then be able to run 1DIR+ as described below. The above steps only need to be done once, when you install or re-install 1DIR+. Once 1DIR+ is set to EMS or partially-resident mode, you can start it from 4DOS using the following alias: alias 1dir `setdos /L1 ^ 1dirplus` The SETDOS /L1 is necessary to allow 1DIR+ to send command lines to 4DOS. You must do a SETDOS /L0 when you are done with 1DIR+ in order to get normal 4DOS command-line editing back. You can NOT do this within the alias above, as 1DIR+ returns to 4DOS in order to accomplish its work, and you don't want to switch back to /L0 mode until 1DIRPLUS has been removed from memory. If, after exiting from 1DIR+, you find that 4DOS's command line editing and history are unavailable, it is because you forgot to do the SETDOS /L0. If you go in and out of 1DIR+ regularly aliases like the following can be used to make the process quick: alias 1d `setdos /L1 ^ 1dirplus` alias 1e setdos /L0 ANSI.SYS (various manufacturers): If you have trouble with screen scrolling in 43-line or 50-line mode, try a different version of ANSI. We have had good results with PC Magazine's free utility ANSI.COM, and with the ANSI- UV.SYS program distributed with Personics' UltraVision EGA / VGA enhancement software. Bookshelf CD-ROM (Microsoft): [**] Microsoft Bookshelf uses the environment variable CDPATH, which is also used (for a totally different purpose) by 4DOS. If you are using MS Bookshelf and want to set a CDPATH variable for 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 11 4DOS, set _CDPATH instead. 4DOS will search for _CDPATH first; when it is found, 4DOS will use it, and ignore CDPATH. DESQView (Quarterdeck): Most information about DESQView is in chapter 7 of the manual. Under 4DOS, the DESQView DOS Services option will not work in its default configuration. To make DOS Services work under 4DOS, you must first create a batch file, DOSSERV.BAT, in your DESQView directory to run DOS Services under COMMAND.COM. (We are assum- ing that DESQView is in directory C:\DV and COMMAND.COM is in directory C:\; you will need to modify the settings below if your system is configured differently.) The batch file is: set comspec=c:\command.com c:\dv\dosserv c:\command exit Then, make the following changes on the DESQView change a program screen for DOS Services (items marked ** are on the second page of the screen): * Memory Allocation = 128K or greater * Program Name = C:\DV\DOSSERV.BAT (modify from previous value of C:\DV\DOSSERV). ** Close on Exit to DOS = N ** System Memory = 10K or greater ** Allow Close Window = N Once these steps are taken, you should be able to open the DOS Services window normally. However you will not be able to close it with a close window command. Instead, go to the window where DOS Services allows you to compose a DOS command, and type EXIT to close the window. DR-DOS (Digital Research): 4DOS will work properly as a command processor (including as the primary shell) under DR-DOS 3.4, 5.0, or 6.0. The information below was developed by testing 4DOS under DR-DOS 5.0 and 6.0. Internal vs. External Commands: DR-DOS 5.0's design makes the ASSIGN, JOIN, MORE, and SUBST commands internal (in MS-DOS / PC-DOS they are external). 4DOS supports all MS-DOS internal commands, but does not have internal support for ASSIGN, JOIN, MORE, and SUBST. To ac- cess these DR-DOS internal commands when using 4DOS as the 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 12 command processor, you must set up aliases which run DR-DOS's COMMAND.COM. The following 4DOS aliases accomplish this (adjust these if COMMAND.COM is not in C:\): alias assign `c:\command /c assign %&` alias join `c:\command /c join %&` alias more `c:\command /c more %&` alias subst `c:\command /c subst %&` In DR-DOS 6.0 ASSIGN, JOIN, and SUBST were changed back to external commands, so the corresponding aliases are not nec- essary. For the MORE command, a much better alternative can be set up by aliasing it to the 4DOS LIST command: alias more list /s This provides a scrollable, full-screen display rather than the simple paged display offered by DR-DOS (or MS-DOS) MORE. HILOAD: 4DOS supports DR-DOS's HILOAD feature using the MS-DOS / PC- DOS command names of LOADHIGH or LH. To load a TSR high under DR-DOS, simply use the command: LH [programname] [options] If you want the command to be called HILOAD for complete DR- DOS compatibility, just set up an alias before using it: alias hiload lh Just as under MS-DOS, LOADHIGH and LH will not work properly unless you have memory management software loaded to provide upper memory block support. Because DR-DOS does not return any error to 4DOS if a LOADHIGH operation fails, 4DOS cannot report this condition to you. This means you must use the DR-DOS MEM program or another similar memory mapping utility to determine if your TSR was actually loaded high. File Passwords: 4DOS includes support for DR-DOS file passwords. However the command syntax used to access files with passwords is slight- ly different than under DR-DOS. First, the character used to separate passwords from file- names under DR-DOS is a semicolon [;], which 4DOS uses to separate parts of an "include list" (see the manual for de- tails). Therefore, a slightly different syntax must be used 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 13 when including a DR-DOS password in a 4DOS internal command which accepts wildcards: TWO semicolons should be used to separate the password and filename. 4DOS directory-related commands like MD and CD do not use wildcards and therefore a single semicolon should be used before a password in these commands. All other 4DOS commands which accept wildcards must use the double semicolon. DR-DOS external commands which accept the "password;filename" syntax will still use only a single semicolon. Second, DR-DOS hides files which are password-protected. This means that you must use 4DOS command switches which allow processing of hidden files (COPY /H, DEL /Z, DIR /A, MOVE /H, and SELECT /A) to access a password-protected file under DR-DOS. Passwords are not automatically preserved when copying or moving a file with 4DOS. However the hidden attribute will be preserved. This means that if you move or copy a pass- worded file and want it to be visible in its new location or under its new name, you will have to manually remove the hidden attribute with ATTRIB. For example, to password-protect the file JUNK, copy it to drive A:, and then delete it: password junk /r:fred copy /h junk;;fred a: del /z junk;;fred To unprotect the password-protected file JUNK: password junk;fred /n TASKMAX: 4DOS will work with TASKMAX as long as you start new tasks according to the instructions below. You cannot load 4DOS's resident portion high with UMBLoad = Yes in your 4DOS.INI file when running TASKMAX. TASKMAX will hang the system if it is started while 4DOS is loaded high. In our tests we have found that the same restriction does not apply to the UMBEnvironment directive, which does appear to be compatible with TASKMAX. When TASKMAX is loaded it leaves the primary command proces- sor running as task 1. One way to start another task is to pop up TASKMAX and press Ins. This starts another "instance" of the primary command processor, and may cause significant problems with 4DOS. The reason is that each task started in this way is a copy of the primary command processor, so all 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 14 such tasks will use the same swap area. This will make chan- ges to things like aliases, history, and SETDOS settings in one task "bleed through" to other tasks. The exact nature of the bleed-through will depend on the sequence of operations and the type of 4DOS swapping you use. This bleed-through will not necessarily hang your system but it may lead to very strange and undesired results, especially when running batch files simultaneously in more than one task. There is no way for 4DOS to detect or prevent this condition. We strongly recommend that you do NOT use Ins to start new 4DOS tasks, even if it temporarily appears to work properly on your system. Fortunately TASKMAX offers another way to start new tasks: the TASKMAX /C command. When executed from task 1, a command like: taskmax /c c:\4dos.com will start a new secondary copy of 4DOS as a new task. This new copy is a true secondary shell (not a copy of the primary shell) and will not cause the undesirable interactions de- scribed above. The same approach should be used when start- ing any task which needs a command processor. To start a task which runs a .BTM or .BAT file, use a command like this: taskmax /c c:\4dos.com /c startwp.bat This tells 4DOS to run the specified batch file, and exit automatically (removing the task from the task list) when the batch file is done. If you have tasks you start regularly using the approach described above, use a batch file or a set of 4DOS aliases to help automate the process. Epsilon (Lugaru Software): [**] Epsilon can run 4DOS as a concurrent process, and pass commands to 4DOS for execution. In this mode it traps 4DOS's input re- quests and feeds the keystrokes to 4DOS. However it does not feed backspaces etc. -- only actual characters. This means that editing of input isn't seen by 4DOS. To fix the problem, either run 4DOS as a shell, and not as a concurrent process, or use a SETDOS /L1 for the copy of 4DOS that is run under Epsilon. To use the more flexible SETDOS /L1 approach you must use 4START.BAT (or .BTM) to set up the SETDOS /L1 before running Epsilon. To do so, first set up an alias for Epsilon that sets an environment variable (change the name of the variable if you wish): 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 15 alias eps `set epsi=YES^epsilon %&^unset epsi` Then placing the following line in 4START will issue the SETDOS /L1 command in a secondary shell started by Epsilon, but ignore it otherwise: if "%epsi"=="YES" setdos /l1 GeoWorks Ensemble (GEOS): 4DOS is compatible with GeoWorks Ensemble. To run aliases or BTM files from the DOS Programs screen, you must setup a new program button with 4DOS.COM as the "primary file name" and your alias or BTM as the "optional command line parameters". Commands can be entered the same as on the DOS command line. A longer file of user-written tips for using 4DOS with GeoWorks is available in JP Software's CompuServe support area (PCVENB library 10) as GEOTIP.ZIP. This file includes information on using the undocu- mented GeoWorks "dosAssociations" and "dosParameters" directives to create an even smoother interface between GeoWorks and 4DOS. Hijaak (Inset Systems): The Resident Program Manager (RPM) cannot be loaded from Hijaak's menu when 4DOS is the command processor. If you try to load RPM from the menu you will receive "Out of memory" errors once it is loaded. This is due to the internal design of Hijaak and is not a 4DOS bug. To work around this problem, use the LOADRPM command from the 4DOS prompt, as described in the Hijaak manual. LOADRPM will load RPM with no trouble under 4DOS, the problem occurs when loading from the Hijaak menu only. LOGIMENU (Logitech): [**] If Logitech's LOGIMENU is loaded from a hard disk when running with 4DOS, it leaves a file open each time a menu is unloaded. To work around this problem, load the menu from a floppy disk or RAM disk. Manifest (Quarterdeck): Manifest generally works well with 4DOS. However if there is too little environment space free in 4DOS's master environment, the Hints Detail screen in Manifest may give unexpected results or hang your system. If this occurs, increase your environment size and / or remove some environment variables when starting Manifest if you plan to use the Hints Detail screen. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 16 MOVE-EM (Qualitas): [**] MOVE-EM is compatible with 4DOS's UMBLoad and UMBEnvironment directives as long as Microsoft's HIMEM.SYS is also loaded in your system. MOVE-EM itself does not fully support the XMS spec- ification which permits 4DOS to load itself and the master envi- ronment in high memory. Netware (Novell): [**] The information below was obtained from tests with Netware ver- sions 2.12, 2.15, and 3.11 - 3.2, and Netware 386, and from dis- cussions with Novell support personnel. Compatibility problems between Netware and 4DOS should be quite rare. When they do occur, the usual problem is a conflict be- tween 4DOS and the Netware shell (NET3, NET4, NET5, NETX, EMSNETX, etc.). As a general rule, you should find that Novell's newer "NETX" shell versions have considerably fewer problems than the older NET3 / NET4 / NET5 versions, and we recommend their use with 4DOS whenever possible. Some versions of Netware may occasionally produce a "pipe not found" message when loading under 4DOS. This message refers to Netware features related to COMMAND.COM, and does not apply to 4DOS; the message can be ignored. When loading a secondary 4DOS shell under Netware you can swap the shell to a network drive if you configure 4DOS properly. To do so you must take into account the fact that Netware closes all files -- including the 4DOS swap file -- each time an application exits. Under the default 4DOS configuration, the next time 4DOS uses the swap file, a swap file seek error will occur. However if you set SwapReopen = Yes in 4DOS.INI, 4DOS will reopen its swap file each time such an error occurs, and the swapping will work. See the manual for details on SwapReopen. You can also avoid this problem by swapping to EMS, XMS, or a local hard disk or RAM disk. Use caution with the 4DOS UNSET command under Netware. When Net- ware is loaded it remembers the exact location of the COMSPEC variable in the master environment, and it may therefore have problems if variables such as COMSPEC and PATH are removed and reloaded in a different sequence. The UMBLoad directive in 4DOS.INI is compatible with Netware. The UMBEnvironment directive is compatible with Netware 3.11 and above, but not with earlier versions. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 17 Netware versions prior to 3.11 have a bug which can destroy one or more characters in the name of an environment variable (usual- ly the second or third one in the environment) when setting other environment variables from inside a LOGIN script. If you are setting environment variables such as COMSPEC within your LOGIN script, you can get around this problem by using a batch file to set the variables after LOGIN is complete. Even if you cannot control the LOGIN script, you can still use a batch file to reset the "damaged" variables after LOGIN has finished. One user has successfully worked around this problem by installing several "dummy" variables at the very beginning of AUTOEXEC, for example: set a=a set aa=aa set aaa=aaa When these are installed it is the "dummy" variables which are damaged rather than the meaningful variables (PATH, PROMPT, etc.) which are defined later. This bug is fixed in Netware 3.11 and later versions. Novell MENU (Novell): The Novell MENU system distributed with Netware uses Interrupt 2E to execute menu options, and therefore requires the use of the FullINT2E = Yes directive in 4DOS.INI. Once INT 2E support is enabled with this directive, Novell MENU should work normally under 4DOS. OS/2 1.3 and 2.0 (IBM): 4DOS works properly as the shell in your OS/2 DOS box (version 1.3) or DOS machines (version 2.0). When installing OS/2 version 1.3's dual boot option you may receive a warning because your SHELL command in CONFIG.SYS points to 4DOS rather than COMMAND.COM. In our experience this warning can be ignored, and OS/2 will install properly. If you experience problems running 4DOS in a DOS machine under beta versions of OS/2 2.0, please contact us for assistance. While 4DOS 4.0 does run properly in OS/2 2.0 DOS machines as of the 4DOS 4.0 release date, changes to OS/2 during the version 2.0 beta program may require minor changes in 4DOS. These will be addressed in 4DOS maintenance releases as necessary. PC Tools (Central Point Software): [**] The timed execution function in the PC Tools version 7 DESKTOP program does not work with 4DOS if DESKTOP is loaded directly. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 18 However if SWAPDT (distributed with PC Tools) is used to load DESKTOP, timed execution will work with 4DOS. Personal REXX (Quercus Systems): [**] Personal REXX generally works well with 4DOS. However there are some issues you must take into account when using certain person- al REXX features. The Personal REXX Batch Manager will not work with 4DOS as the command processor. The Batch Manager allows REXX programs to be executed from the command line without requiring a REXX or RX command prefix. The Batch Manager accomplishes this by using an undocumented feature of COMMAND.COM, and Mansfield Software states that this may not work on OEM versions of DOS, and advises that if it does not work, don't use it. To work around this problem, use executable extensions to tell 4DOS to execute .REX files using REXX.EXE. To set this up, add a command like this to your AUTOEXEC.BAT file: set .rex=d:\path\rexx.exe where "d:\path" is the drive and directory where REXX.EXE is stored. Once this executable extension is set up, REXX programs will run as though the Batch Manager was installed. Note, howev- er, that the Batch Manager would attempt the execution of REXX programs before .BAT files, whereas 4DOS executable extensions are executed after .BTM and .BAT files. Personal REXX also provides the ADDRESS DOS statement, which allows the REXX program to pass commands to the DOS command pro- cessor. This function is implemented through the undocumented INT 2E interface to the command processor, which can be enabled in 4DOS with the FullINT2E=Yes directive in 4DOS.INI. If you use FullINT2E=Yes and have trouble with ADDRESS DOS, use Personal REXX's OPTIONS NEWCOM, or an environment variable, SET RXNEWCOM=YES, to force ADDRESS DOS to shell to a new copy of 4DOS. Note that the normal Personal REXX ADDRESS DOS function permits the environment to be permanently modified, whereas using OPTIONS NEWCOM, or setting the environment variable will not permit this. Quercus Systems discourages the use of the INT 2E approach in DOS 4.00 or later, and Personal REXX will default to not using INT 2E with these versions of DOS. QEMM and QRAM (Quarterdeck): The information below was obtained from tests with QEMM versions 5 and 6, and user reports on QRAM. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 19 Both QEMM (including the QEMM 6 STEALTH mode) and QRAM are com- patible with 4DOS, and will allow you to load the 4DOS resident code and the master environment into high DOS memory (UMBs) via the UMBLoad and UMBEnvironment directives in 4DOS.INI. For these directives to work with QRAM you must have QEXT loaded also (this is the normal method of loading QRAM). QEMM allocates both XMS and EMS memory from the same memory area. Therefore it always reports the exact same amount of free XMS and EMS memory. You will see this in the free EMS and free XMS val- ues displayed by the 4DOS MEMORY command -- they will be exactly the same under QEMM. Just remember that if both values are (say) 512K, that means you have 512K of free memory which can be allo- cated either way -- not 1024K! If you use FILES.COM to load part of the DOS file handle table into high memory, you must follow Quarterdeck's recommendations and keep a minimum of FILES=8 in CONFIG.SYS. Lower values may cause 4DOS to hang during boot, especially if disk swapping is used. If you use QEMM's OPTIMIZE and your AUTOEXEC has 4DOS-specific commands like GLOBAL, IFF, aliases, etc., OPTIMIZE will recognize them based on the 4DOS.CMD file distributed with QEMM 6. Note that this file is incomplete in that it does not include the ELSE, ELSEIFF, and ENDIFF commands; you should add these commands to 4DOS.CMD if you use them in your AUTOEXEC file. Also note that OPTIMIZE cannot take account of the fact that 4DOS may be loaded high with UMBLoad = Yes in 4DOS.INI, and therefore may not give the best optimization results when UMBLoad = Yes is used (OPTIMIZE has this problem with all programs which load them- selves into UMBs, not just with 4DOS). SigmaPlot (Sigma Designs): [**] The batch file PLOT.BAT used to start some versions of SigmaPlot uses an outdated method of determining DOS version which will fail under 4DOS, reporting that "SigmaPlot requires DOS 2.0 or later". You can fix this batch file easily. At the beginning of the file, look for the group of lines which reads: dosver for %%v in (1,2,3,4) do if errorlevel %%v goto DosVer%%v echo Error! Can't determine DOS version. Replace these three lines with the following single line: goto DosVerX where "X" is the version of DOS you are running (i.e. DosVer3, DosVer4, etc.). 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 20 Software Carousel (SoftLogic Solutions): Please see the general section on multitaskers in chapter 7 of the manual before reading this section. The information below was obtained from tests with Software Car- ousel version 3, and discussions with SoftLogic technical sup- port. It applies to all versions of Software Carousel. Software Carousel will not work properly with 4DOS loaded as the primary shell. It is designed with the assumption that COMMAND.COM is the system command processor, and contains logic which specifically depends on COMMAND.COM and the way it is writ- ten, and which actually modifies the copy of COMMAND.COM in memo- ry. This makes it impossible to write a program which works properly as an alternate command processor loaded underneath (i.e. before) Software Carousel. However, 4DOS can be run without difficulty inside a Software Carousel partition, if the instructions below are followed. When loading 4DOS into a Carousel partition, the best method is to leave the COMSPEC set to COMMAND.COM when Carousel is loaded. 4DOS should then be set up in the Carousel options file just like any other program. For example, to load 4DOS into partition 1: d:\path\4DOS.COM [parameters] [filename] where: d:\path is the drive and path where 4DOS.COM is lo- cated [parameters] is any 4DOS command line parameters (/E, @ininame, etc.; do NOT use /P here) [filename] is the name of a batch file to be executed when the partition is started To use different 4DOS.INI files for different Software Carousel partitions, use the "@ininame" parameter in the "parameters" section of your Carousel setup to invoke a specific file. For example, the parameters could be set to @D:\WP\4DOSWP.INI to use that initialization file for the WP partition. Because 4DOS can only be loaded in a partition when running Soft- ware Carousel, and not as the primary command processor, using 4DOS disk swapping in multiple partitions is subject to the cau- tionary note on this subject in the general information section on multitaskers in the manual; please read it carefully. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 21 TSRCOM Utilities (TurboPower Software): The TSRCOM utilities will work properly with 4DOS as long as you use TSRCOM version 2.6 or later. The current release is version 3.0, and is available on the 4DOS Utility Disk and on many bulle- tin boards and on-line systems. If you use TSRCOM's MARK and RELEASE to manage your TSRs, 4DOS swapping (as set with the SWAPPING command) must be in the same state when RELEASE is run as it was when MARK (or FMARK) was run. This is a characteristic of the design of MARK and RELEASE (or any other such products), and not a bug. If you do not observe this rule (for example, if you run MARK with SWAPPING OFF in AUTOEXEC and later run RELEASE from the prompt with SWAPPING ON), you may receive unusual error messages or hang your system. The same restriction applies to MARKNET and RELNET. UltraVision (Personics): The DE program distributed with UltraVision is written specifi- cally for COMMAND.COM, and cannot be used to set directory colors with 4DOS. Use 4DOS's built-in directory colorization instead. Ventura Publisher (Xerox): [**] Ventura Publisher version 2.0 has a bug which prevents it from working properly if more than about 256 bytes of environment space are in use. If necessary, you can write a small batch file to reduce environment space in use while Ventura Publisher is running. See the section headed "Solving Software Compatibility Problems" in chapter 7 of the manual for information on creating this kind of batch file. Windows 3.0 (Microsoft): Most information about Windows 3.0 is in chapter 7 of the manual. See the section on PATH problems earlier in this file for one caution related to the Setup Applications program. Programs Requiring PATH to be Under 128 Characters: The following programs contain bugs which prevent them from work- ing properly if you have a PATH which is over 128 characters long. Since 4DOS allows you to create a PATH up to 255 charac- ters long this can appear to be a conflict between the program involved and 4DOS. If your path is longer than 128 characters, see the section headed "Solving Software Compatibility Problems" in chapter 7 of the manual for information on creating a batch 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 22 file to reduce the PATH length while one of these programs is running. Computer Select CD-ROM Database (Ziff-Davis): [**] Computer Select cannot find its help program if your PATH is over 128 characters long. RenderMan (AutoDesk): RenderMan will hang your system if it is started with a PATH longer than 128 characters. VINES Network (Banyan): [**] VINES' installation may not work properly if your PATH is longer than 128 characters. Windows 3.0 (Microsoft): The Windows 3 Setup Applications option, which scans your disk drives for applications to be added to Windows program groups, will not work properly if your PATH is more than 128 characters long. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 23 Software For Use With 4DOS -------------------------- We receive many requests for recommendations on software that works well with 4DOS, or that we have found especially useful. While we can't recommend what will work well on your system or to meet your needs, we can tell you what packages we have used and found valu- able. We will confine our comments to our primary area of expertise -- system software -- and avoid discussing applications programs like spreadsheets and word processors. Please note that this is NOT actually a list of what works well with 4DOS -- the answer to that is, almost everything! And remember this is only our opinions -- you need to choose what will work best for you. Memory Managers: We generally use 386MAX and BlueMax (Qualitas) on our own systems because we find it offers some important technical advantages. Many 4DOS users also report excellent results with QEMM (Quarterdeck), and we use it at times as well. We have less experi- ence with other memory managers like Netroom (Helix) and Memory Com- mander (V Communications), so we can't comment on them. Task Switchers: For switching between applications which run one at a time, the primary products we're aware of are Back & Forth (Pro- gressive Solutions) and Software Carousel (SoftLogic). This category is an exception to our "everything works well with 4DOS" rule: Soft- ware Carousel does work with 4DOS, but is designed to depend on COMMAND.COM and requires special care when used with 4DOS (see above for details). Back & Forth works seamlessly with 4DOS, and many 4DOS users are enthusiastic about its features, support, and price. Back & Forth contains a number of features specifically created with 4DOS in mind (for example, it knows that .BTM files are executable like batch files), and JP Software and Progressive Solutions communicate regularly to make sure that 4DOS and Back & Forth continue to work well together. Multitaskers: For switching between applications and allowing more than one application to run at a time, the primary products are DESQ- View (Quarterdeck) and Windows 3.0 (Microsoft). We have used both and find that for us they have different advantages and disadvantag- es. We find DESQView to be more reliable than Windows but we also find Windows applications that use the Windows platform to do much more than what can be done under DESQView (for example the 4DOS 4.0 manual text and pages were produced entirely in Word for Windows 1.1). You need to evaluate which of these programs meets your needs the best. Disk Caches: There are dozens of products available in this catego- ry. We use Super PC-Kwik (MultiSoft) and HyperDisk (Hyperware) and 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 24 have found both to be reliable and to work well with 4DOS. We can't speak from any direct experience about other caching programs. Disk Expanders: We have had excellent results using Stacker (Stac Electronics) to expand disk drive space. We currently run Stacker on both notebook and desktop systems. We sometimes get a little less than Stac's claimed 2:1 disk space savings, but this is a minor point compared to Stacker's reliability, speed, and value. There are other products which perform the same function; we have not used or evalu- ated any of them. Video Utilities: We use UltraVision (Personics) regularly on all of our systems which have VGA video or better, and we use Laptop Ultra- Vision on laptop or notebook systems. UltraVision allows excellent control over all aspects of VGA and EGA video systems including fonts, colors, and screen sizes. It is fully compatible with 4DOS and many 4DOS users have found it to be a valuable tool. We are not aware of any other products which do what UltraVision does. Boot Utilities: We can't speak about this issue from any distance because we sell one such utility, BOOT.SYS, and use it on all our systems. BOOT.SYS was the first of these utilities to allow selec- tion of a configuration during the boot process, and is an excellent tool for configuration management. There are other products in this category but we are not familiar with them. 4DOS 4.0 [11-1-91] APPNOTES.DOC page 25