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--------------------------------------------------------------------- Norton Utilities 6.0 NDOS Compatibility Documentation --------------------------------------------------------------------- This file provides information on compatibility between NDOS and a variety of other software products. It is intended for use whenever you have a question about using another product with NDOS, or suspect a compatibility problem. Inclusion of a product in this file does not mean there are compatibility problems; rather, it only indicates that there is some information that may be useful to you when you use the product with NDOS. This file can be viewed with a file viewer such as the NDOS LIST command, or printed on most PC printers using the command: LP COMPAT.DOC /H60 Information in this file is presented in the following order: INTRODUCTION GENERAL INFORMATION Causes of Compatibility Problems Multi-Way Software Interactions Running NDOS along with COMMAND.COM Executing DOS Commands via Interrupt 2E NDOS and Multitasking/Task Switching Programs CAUTION: Multitaskers and Disk Swapping Swapping to RAM Disks Loading NDOS High with /U or /E:nnnnU NDOS SWAPPING OFF Command and 286/386 Memory Managers Running NDOS on a Laptop or Notebook Computer NDOS and Command Line Editing Programs NDOS and TSR (Memory-Resident) Programs INFORMATION ON SPECIFIC PRODUCTS MS-DOS APPEND Command MS-DOS 4.0+ FORMAT Command MS-DOS 4.0+ SELECT Command 1-2-3 (Lotus) 1DIR+ (Bourbaki) 3+Open Network (3COM) ANSI.SYS (various manufacturers) DESQView (Quarterdeck) DESQView DOS Services (Quarterdeck) DoubleDOS (SoftLogic Solutions) DR-DOS (Digital Research) Epsilon (Lugaru Software) GeoWorks Ensemble (GEOS) Headroom (Helix Software) Hijaak (Inset Systems) HIMEM.SYS (Microsoft) LOGIMENU (Logitech) MOVE-EM (Qualitas) MTEZ Fax Software Netware (Novell) Novell MENU (Novell) OmniMouse Software Drivers QEMM and QRAM (Quarterdeck) SideKick 2.0 (Borland) SigmaPlot (Sigma Designs) Software Carousel (SoftLogic Solutions) Telix Communications Software TSRCOM Utilities (TurboPower Software) UltraVision (Personics) Ventura Publisher (Xerox) VTSR (Golden Bow Systems) Windows 3.0 (Microsoft) WordPerfect 5.1 (WordPerfect Corp.) INTRODUCTION ------------ Every effort has been made to insure that this file is as accurate and up to date as possible. The information is based on our own investigations, conversations with manufacturers of other products, and reports from our beta testers. Unfortunately, testing for software compatibility is not always reliable. 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. In some cases we have found that upgrading another manufacturer's software to a newer release helps with a particular problem. Unfortunately we cannot guarantee that it will always do so on your system, for the reasons described above. If you have a compatibility problem, the first thing you should do is read through Appendix C, "Tips and Troubleshooting," in the NDOS manual. This appendix gives general suggestions for solving compatibility problems, and should always be used along with this file when attempting to solve such a problem. If the information in Appendix C doesn't help, check below for both general suggestions which pertain to your problem, and information on the specific product with which you are having trouble. Please note that some products are listed by category rather than or in addition to specific listings by product name; check the list of topics carefully to see where any particular product may be covered. Most compatibility problems with NDOS can be diagnosed easily with one of three methods: checking this file for specific information; trying different NDOS swapping methods (XMS, EMS, disk, or none); and testing for interactions by removing all drivers and TSRs which are not absolutely necessary and then replacing them one at a time, as described in Appendix C. These techniques may not tell you how to solve the problem, but they will go a long way toward identifying the cause. Of course, if you cannot diagnose or resolve a compatibility problem, please contact the technical support department. GENERAL INFORMATION ------------------- This section describes some techniques you can use to either diagnose or to solve compatibility problems. It also includes general information which may be used in solving problems with a whole group of products (for example, multitaskers). Causes of Compatibility Problems: In most cases software which does not to run properly under NDOS is experiencing one of the following problems: * NDOS is not configured properly; * The other software is not configured properly; * Some condition in your system (for example, insufficient memory) is preventing the other software from running at all, but you are so used to NDOS that you haven't noticed that the same problem occurs under COMMAND.COM (that is, the problem is not related to NDOS); * There is a multi-way interaction between NDOS, the other software, and one or more of your TSRs or device drivers; * The presence of NDOS in your system has uncovered a bug or design problem in the other software that did not appear when running it under COMMAND.COM, but that is not due to a malfunction or error in NDOS; * The other software was written based on specific characteristics of COMMAND.COM, and cannot run under NDOS unless COMMAND.COM is also loaded; * The other software was written based on specific characteristics of COMMAND.COM, and cannot run under NDOS at all. Multi-Way Software Interactions: In many cases programs which appear to fail under NDOS, yet run properly under COMMAND.COM, are actually involved in a three-way interaction with one of your TSRs or device drivers. If you are having trouble with a program, try removing then replacing your TSRs and device drivers as described in Appendix C of the NDOS manual. See if you can determine whether there is such an interaction occurring. Running NDOS along with COMMAND.COM: You may find a rare program which will not work under NDOS, 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 NDOS and COMMAND.COM together in order to diagnose such a problem. There are two methods of loading COMMAND.COM before another program. 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 NDOS. 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 problems such as "Invalid COMMAND.COM" errors when using this method, use a batch file like the following to run the program in question (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 NDOS. This approach is rarely necessary, and will use about 4 to 5K of additional RAM for the resident portion of COMMAND.COM. The following steps will set your system up to boot with COMMAND.COM, and run NDOS automatically as part of the boot process: (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 NDOS were not on your system. (2) Be sure the statement: DEVICE=KEYSTACK.SYS is included in CONFIG.SYS if you wish to use the NDOS KEYSTACK command. (3) 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 NDOS is started. This might include loading any TSRs which you cannot get to load properly under NDOS. Part 2, which you must place in a separate batch file (we suggest the name NDAUTO.BAT, but you can use any name with a .BAT or .BTM extension), should contain the commands you wish to have NDOS execute when it is started. (4) Place the following line as the last line in the modified AUTOEXEC.BAT: NDOS parameters filename where "parameters" represents the appropriate NDOS parameters for swapping, environment and history size, etc. (see Chapter 6 of the NDOS 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 NDOS will re-run AUTOEXEC and therefore load itself again, ad infinitum! This will load COMMAND.COM, execute the commands in AUTOEXEC, load NDOS, execute the commands in your new batch file, and then give you the normal NDOS prompt. There is one drawback to this second approach: because NDOS 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 NDOS variable function %@EVAL, which will return "4" under NDOS 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. Executing DOS Commands via Interrupt 2E: COMMAND.COM contains an undocumented (and unsupported) feature which allows programs to execute DOS commands by passing the command through software interrupt number 2E (hex). Very few programs use this feature, and the current release of NDOS does not support it internally. However the NDOS2E TSR included with NDOS will allow you to run most programs that use INT 2E. If you have a program which is supposed to execute DOS commands and it does not work under NDOS, first read the Tips and Troubleshooting appendix in the NDOS manual and check over your settings of COMSPEC and NDSHELL. If these appear correct, your program may be trying to use INT 2E to execute commands. If you believe this is the case, try loading the NDOS2E program which came with your copy of NDOS. Documentation on NDOS2E is in Appendix A of the NDOS manual. If you aren't sure whether your program is using INT 2E, NDOS2E's /W switch can help you find out. See below for specific information on Novell's MENU program, which requires NDOS2E. NDOS and Multitasking/Task Switching Programs: (For convenience below we will refer to all these programs as "multitasking," even though some are only task switching programs, and to all windows or partitions they use as "windows," even though some systems do not support windowing). NDOS can be used with most multitasking systems including Windows, DESQView, Back and Forth, OmniView, Software Carousel, and VM/386. See the sections on specific products below for information on the individual products. Unless otherwise noted below, NDOS should work properly both as the root shell loaded before the multitasking system, or when run inside a window. To start NDOS inside a window in any of these systems you can define it as a program to be run directly, or you can have the multitasker load it automatically as the command processor, by leaving COMSPEC set to NDOS. Most multitaskers will load NDOS automatically to run other programs, and you probably don't need to intervene in this process -- the multitasking system can generally do so implicitly with no trouble. However when you want a window that will give you access to the NDOS prompt, things usually work best if you set the window up to run NDOS.COM explicitly, rather than using the multitasker's generic "DOS" window setup. Regardless of the approach used, you can use the NDSHELL environment variable to set the NDOS command line parameters (such as swapping method and environment size) to be used when starting NDOS in a window. If NDOS is defined as a program to be run directly you can also set these parameters on the command line. Under most multitasking systems the COMSPEC setting will control whether NDOS or COMMAND.COM is used to run batch files and to open windows that are NOT closed on exit to DOS. In most cases you will find it works best to leave the COMSPEC set to NDOS. CAUTION: Multitaskers and Disk Swapping: When NDOS is swapping to disk in multiple windows of a multitasking system, it must be configured properly to avoid conflicts among the swap file names used in each window. When loaded normally, the primary copy of NDOS will act as a "traffic cop" for the copies of NDOS in the different windows, assigning each one a unique "shell number" which is used as the extension for the disk swap file (NDOSSWAP.001, NDOSSWAP.002, etc.). In this case no conflict will occur. However, if NDOS is NOT loaded before the multitasking program this capability will not be available. In this case the copy of NDOS in each window will use the swap file name NDOSSWAP.000. To avoid a filename conflict every copy of NDOS started in disk swapping mode MUST place its swap file in its own unique directory specified with the "/S:Dd:\path" switch. If this rule is not observed the system will hang when switching windows or upon exit from an application. In NDOS, disk swap files default to the root directory of the drive COMSPEC points to; hence to make NDOS disk swapping work properly you must EXPLICITLY use /S:D to place the swap files in separate directories. This problem will only occur if NDOS is NOT the primary shell, AND disk swapping is used in more than one window as described above. There is no such conflict with EMS or XMS swapping. Note that since the default /S:B swapping option uses disk swapping if no EMS or XMS memory is available, you can be invoking disk swapping your multitasker windows even if you haven't explicitly requested it. 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. Loading NDOS High with /U or /E:nnnnU: To load NDOS or the master environment into high memory with the /U or /E:nnnnU switches, you MUST be running a memory manager or a combination of a memory manager and XMS driver which provides BOTH the ability to remap memory into the area between 640K and 1MB, AND software support for the eXtended Memory Specification (XMS). Another way of saying this is that, in general, /U and /E:nnnnU will work on any system which can load TSRs high. The combinations of hardware and software which will support /U and /E:nnnnU include: 386 systems: Hardware: Sufficient memory space; no additional hardware required. Software: Qualitas's 386MAX or Blue Max, Quarterdeck's QEMM version 5.0 or later, or another similar 386 memory manager (HIMEM.SYS alone is NOT sufficient). 286 systems: Hardware: Chips and Technologies NEAT chip set, or EMS board with LIM 4.0 or EEMS hardware; sufficient memory space. Software: Qualitas's MOVE-EM version 1.02 or later with Microsoft's HIMEM.SYS, or Quarterdeck's QRAM and QEXT. Other memory-management software may also work; the listings above are examples only. Also, look for specific information on your memory management program below. The following software will NOT allow /U or /E:nnnnU to work: HIMEM.SYS by itself; QRAM without QEXT; or MOVE-EM without HIMEM.SYS. Also these switches will not work on systems with expanded memory boards with LIM 3. 2 hardware (regardless of the software used); if you are trying to load NDOS (or TSRs) high using an expanded memory board you need hardware which supports either LIM 4.0 EMS, or the similar EEMS. Check with your system or board manufacturer to determine whether your board supports LIM 4.0 or EEMS. NDOS SWAPPING OFF Command and 286/386 Memory Managers: When you use the NDOS SWAPPING OFF command to speed up your batch files, especially AUTOEXEC.BAT, you can generate occasional conflicts with some 386 memory management software when loading TSRs "high" (above 640K). The conflicts usually appear as "Memory allocation chain" errors (or another similar message) during the load high process. If these occur, try leaving SWAPPING ON when loading TSRs high and see if it solves the problem. If not, the problem lies elsewhere. Running NDOS on a Laptop or Notebook Computer: When you run NDOS on a laptop or notebook system, you may need to consider any unusual boot sequence used on your system when you install NDOS or modify CONFIG.SYS. Many laptop and notebook computers boot from a floppy drive or hard disk, and on these system NDOS generally can be installed normally. However, if your system boots from ROM (ROM = "Read Only Memory" chips inside your computer) as -- for example -- many Tandy laptops do, then you need to consider a couple of issues. First, systems which boot from ROM often can be configured to use the ROM boot feature, or to disable it and boot from the floppy or hard disk. The comments below apply only when the ROM boot feature is enabled. With ROM boot enabled, your system will read DOS and CONFIG.SYS from ROM when the power is turned on. Since the manufacturer wrote that CONFIG.SYS file, and it can't be changed (it's in ROM), it's likely to work. Where things get interesting is when your system allows you to boot from ROM, but locate your CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT files on the hard disk or floppy disk. Some laptops and notebook systems do have this capability. Then, when you make a mistake in CONFIG.SYS that keeps your system from booting, there's no way to tell the ROM boot program to ignore the bad CONFIG.SYS file. As a result, you may have to take drastic measures (for example, open the case and physically disconnect the hard disk) to get the system to ignore your mistaken CONFIG.SYS file and boot properly. For this reason, we recommend that if you have a system which boots from ROM, and you have the system configured to read CONFIG.SYS from the hard disk, that you reconfigure the system to boot directly from disk before modifying CONFIG.SYS for any reason (NDOS-related or not). This will allow you to boot from a floppy disk if you make a "fatal error" in the copy of CONFIG.SYS on your hard disk. Once you have things working properly, switch back to the ROM boot setup. The second -- and related -- issue is that systems which boot from ROM typically consider the ROM to be a sort of disk "drive". For example, on a system with drive C: as the hard disk, drive D: may be the ROM. When booting from ROM, the ROM drive is typically the "current drive" at boot time, and that's where NDOS will look for the NSTART and AUTOEXEC files. But of course they won't be on the ROM drive -- they'll be where you put them, on your hard disk or floppy disk. When this happens NDOS won't execute NSTART or AUTOEXEC at system boot. (This doesn't happen with COMMAND.COM because manufacturers of such systems modify COMMAND.COM specifically to get around this difficulty). If you run into this problem, first be sure you've got a /P on your SHELL= line -- if you don't that will also keep NDOS from running AUTOEXEC. If that's OK, you probably need to use an NDOS feature that allows you to put your own command at the end of the SHELL= line in CONFIG.SYS. Just create a batch file that runs NSTART (if you're using it) and AUTOEXEC with their full paths, for example: NDINIT.BAT: call c:\nstart.btm call c:\autoexec.bat Then, on your SHELL= line in CONFIG.SYS, add the full name of this file at the end of the line, for example: shell=c:\ndos.com /p c:\ndinit.bat This will tell NDOS to run your startup files "manually," since they won't be run automatically. (Use care that you don't exceed the line length limit for the SHELL= line; if you do, create an options file and place the NDOS options -- including the batch file name -- in that file. See Chapter 6 of the NDOS manual.) If you have a system like this NDOS will probably set the COMSPEC to the ROM drive, and you'll have to correct this in AUTOEXEC to point to the hard disk or floppy disk. For example: set comspec=c:\ndos.com See also the section on COMSPEC in the Chapter 6 of the NDOS manual for more information. Finally, if you have a laptop with a color (CGA, EGA, or VGA) video board and a monochrome screen, you may need to use the NHELP /LCD option -- or run the NUCONFIG program and select LCD colors there. In setting up your laptop or notebook to meet our recommendations, of course you must read the instructions that came with it, and contact the manufacturer if you have trouble. These systems are relatively new and the approach taken by each manufacturer is unique; the proper way to modify your system configuration will depend on the particular system you have. NDOS and Command Line Editing Programs: Programs such as Anarkey (Moderne Software), PCED (Cove Software), and ReDOS (Multisoft) will work properly with NDOS. However these programs require the use of SETDOS /L1 to operate, which will disable NDOS's command recall and command line editing. In most cases you will be able to switch back and forth between NDOS editing and the other editor by toggling the SETDOS /L state. When another editor is used NDOS's command history will be maintained, and can be viewed with HISTORY, but will not be available for recall until a SETDOS /L0 is executed. NDOS aliases, executable extensions, and other features will be active regardless of the SETDOS /L state. Aliases will be processed after any processing 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 NDOS! NDOS and TSR (Memory-Resident) Programs: In NDOS many memory-resident programs should be able to unload themselves. You may still experience unload problems if you have a complex system or many TSRs loaded; if you do, use a TSR manager. These products will allow you to unload virtually all TSRs without difficulty. INFORMATION ON SPECIFIC PRODUCTS -------------------------------- The information below is listed alphabetically by product, with manufacturers' names included. MS-DOS commands are listed before other software products (the term "MS-DOS" includes PC-DOS as well). Items marked with two asterisks [**] after the product name were supplied by beta testers. 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. Subsequent uses of APPEND to adjust the APPEND path use the internal portion built into COMMAND.COM. NDOS does not support the internal portion of APPEND command. This means that you cannot change the APPEND path directly from NDOS. However you can still use APPEND with NDOS. APPEND should be started in the usual way, from AUTOEXEC or any other batch file, or from the command line. However to change the APPEND path you must run APPEND from COMMAND.COM, not from NDOS. 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 NDOS 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 NDOS directory searches for many NDOS commands (as it does for COMMAND.COM). Please note that this makes APPEND dangerous: if you APPEND a directory and then (say) delete all the .BAK files, the .BAK files in the APPENDed directory will be deleted too. The APPEND /E switch will not work with NDOS. CAUTION: APPEND is a dangerous command. 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 NDOS to place descriptions which go with files in one directory in the description file for another directory, because with APPEND running NDOS 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 NDOS file description files from getting mixed up between directories. For this reason NDOS will automatically set this switch if it detects that you are running APPEND and DOS 4.0 or above. MS-DOS 4.0+ FORMAT Command: When formatting a bootable disk with FORMAT /S, the FORMAT command in MS-DOS 4.0 and above will copy whatever file your COMSPEC environment variable points to to the target disk and renaming it COMMAND.COM. When NDOS is running COMSPEC normally points to NDOS.COM, so FORMAT will copy NDOS.COM to the floppy disk and rename it COMMAND.COM. This will render the floppy disk NOT bootable -- NDOS won't mind the file name change, but NDOS.COM alone is not enough for NDOS to get started; NDOS.OVL is also required. To solve this problem, after formatting a bootable floppy disk under MS-DOS 4.0, copy COMMAND.COM to the disk manually. You may want to set up a simple alias or batch file for this purpose, for example: alias bootdisk `format a:/s^copy c:\command.com a:` Alternatively, you can copy the NDOS.OVL file to the root directory of the floppy disk, which will make the disk boot under NDOS instead of COMMAND.COM. However this method is NOT recommended unless you also rename the "COMMAND.COM" file back to NDOS.COM and place a proper CONFIG.SYS file on the floppy disk to load NDOS.COM. Leaving a copy of NDOS.COM on the disk with the name COMMAND.COM is bound to confuse the next person who examines it! 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 NDOS 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 following 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 NDOS SELECT command: alias select c:\dos\select. exe alias sel *select 1-2-3 (Lotus) 1-2-3 version 2.3 ignores the COMPSEC environment variable when it runs a DOS shell, and instead always runs COMMAND.COM. This is a limitation in 1-2-3. See the section "Running NDOS along with COMMAND.COM" for information on how you may be able work around this problem. 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 NDOS 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 NDOS once started. If your copy of 1DIR+ is set up for fully resident mode, you can load it into memory under NDOS to switch it to partially resident 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 (F8 then F2) 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" (F8 then F8). 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 NDOS using the following alias: alias 1dir `setdos /L1 ^ 1dirplus` The SETDOS /L1 is necessary to allow 1DIR+ to send command lines to NDOS. You must do a SETDOS /L0 when you are done with 1DIR+ in order to get normal NDOS command-line editing back. You can NOT do this within the alias above, as 1DIR+ returns to NDOS 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 NDOS'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 3+Open Network (3COM): [**] If your system hangs when loading 3+Open's NBP program, upgrading to the latest release of NBP should resolve the problem. Please note that 3COM issues multiple releases with the same version number; the fact that you have "version 1.1" does not necessarily mean you have the latest release. Check with your 3COM support representative to be sure you have the latest release. ANSI.SYS (various manufacturers): If you have trouble with screen scrolling in 43-line or 50-line mode, try a different version of ANSI; for more information see Appendix C of the NDOS manual. If the CLS command resets your screen to black even though you have ANSI.SYS loaded and have set up your own colors, try using the command SETDOS /A1. This will force NDOS to use ANSI.SYS to clear the screen. DESQView (Quarterdeck): Please see the section on multitaskers under General Information above before reading this section. The information below was obtained from tests with DESQView versions 2.26 and 2.3. To use NDOS with DESQview, you must add it to your DESQview Open Window menu. To do this, select the Add a Program option, then press the "O" key (for Other Program). Press Enter and you will get a standard Change a Program window. You must set the program parameters and startup directory before opening an NDOS window. Set the Program Name to d:\path\NDOS.COM where "d:\path" is the drive and directory where NDOS.COM is stored. Set the Parameters to whatever NDOS startup options you want (swapping type, environment size, etc. -- do NOT use /C or /P). For other DESQView parameters, the defaults are workable except for the following changes: Writes Text Directly to Screen Y (screen 1) Close on Exit to DOS Y (screen 2) Uses its Own Colors Y (screen 2) These parameters assume that you are running NDOS in a full-screen window; if so the window dimensions on screen 2 must be set accordingly. You may wish to run NDOS in a window smaller than the full screen. If so, set the window dimensions accordingly and change the "Writes Text Directly to Screen" field to "N". NDOS is written to be "Desqview-aware," and will not "bleed through" when running full-screen commands (DRAWBOX, DRAWHLINE, DRAWVLINE, LIST, SCRPUT, and SELECT) in such a window. We have found that the only ANSI driver which works properly in a window smaller than the full screen is Quarterdeck's DVANSI.COM. If you need to load DVANSI.COM, you can do so from a window startup batch file as described in the next paragraph. You can set up a startup batch file to be run when a DESQView window is opened -- just create it, and place its name (with drive and path if necessary) as the last thing on the Parameters line. This batch file will be run after and independently of any NSTART.BAT or NSTART.BTM file. When closing a DESQView window which has loaded a copy of NDOS, you should exit the application (if you're at the NDOS prompt, use the EXIT command) rather than just closing the window with DESQView's Close Window command. The Close Window command simply removes NDOS from memory, and gives no opportunity for NDOS to free up its resources such as the shell number, swap file, and any reserved EMS or XMS blocks. As a result, you can gradually use up some of these resources if you repeatedly open such windows and then close them with the Close Window command. DESQView will work properly with the NDOS /U and /E:nnnnU options in the primary shell, but may not work properly if these options are set in NDSHELL and/or used explicitly in a DESQView window. The NDOS /E:nnnnS (swapped environment) option is incompatible with DESQView. DESQView DOS Services (Quarterdeck): Under NDOS, the DESQView DOS Services option will not work in its default configuration. To make DOS Services work under NDOS, you must first create a batch file, DOSSERV.BAT, in your DESQView directory to run DOS Services under COMMAND.COM. (We are assuming 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 = 100K 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. DoubleDOS (SoftLogic Solutions): See Software Carousel. DR-DOS (Digital Research): [**] NDOS will work properly as a command processor (including as the primary shell) under DR-DOS 3.x or 5.0. DR-DOS's design makes the ASSIGN, JOIN, and SUBST commands internal (in MS-DOS/PC-DOS they are external). To access these commands when using NDOS as the command processor, you must set up aliases which run DR-DOS's COMMAND.COM to invoke the commands. The following NDOS 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 subst `c:\command /c subst %&` Epsilon (Lugaru Software): [**] Epsilon can run NDOS as a concurrent process, and pass commands to NDOS for execution. In this mode it traps NDOS's input requests and feeds the keystrokes to NDOS. However it does not feed backspaces and such -- only actual characters. This means that editing of input isn't seen by NDOS. To fix the problem, either run NDOS as a shell, and not as a concurrent process, or use a SETDOS /L1 for the copy of NDOS that is run under Epsilon. To use the more flexible SETDOS /L1 approach you must use NSTART.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): alias eps `set epsi=YES^epsilon %&^unset epsi` Then placing the following line in NSTART 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): NDOS is generally entirely compatible with GeoWorks Ensemble. To run aliases or BTM files from the DOS Programs screen, you must set up a new program button with NDOS.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 tips for using NDOS with GeoWorks is available from technical support. This file includes information on using the undocumented GeoWorks "dosAssociations" and "dosParameters" directives to create an even smoother interface between GeoWorks and NDOS. Headroom (Helix Software): [**] NDOS and Headroom should work properly together. Headroom will NOT work correctly if the COMSPEC is not set properly; if you do have trouble, check your COMSPEC (see Chapter 6 of the NDOS manual). Hijaak (Inset Systems): The Resident Program Manager (RPM) cannot be loaded from Hijaak's menu when NDOS 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 NDOS bug; we are working with Inset Systems to address the problem. To work around this problem, use the LOADRPM command from the NDOS prompt, as described in the Hijaak manual. LOADRPM will load RPM with no trouble under NDOS, the problem occurs when loading from the Hijaak menu only. HIMEM.SYS (Microsoft): NDOS's XMS swapping will work properly with HIMEM.SYS, but HIMEM.SYS alone does NOT support the memory mapping required to use the NDOS /U and /E:nnnnU options. See the general section on /U and /E:nnnnU above for more information. LOGIMENU (Logitech): [**] If Logitech's LOGIMENU is loaded from a hard disk when running with NDOS, 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. MOVE-EM (Qualitas): [**] MOVE-EM version 1.00 contains a bug which causes the system to crash whenever any program attempts to access XMS memory. NDOS will attempt to access XMS memory if you specify the /U or /E:nnnnU option, or use the MEMORY command, so these NDOS features cannot be used if MOVE-EM 1.00 is installed. MOVE-EM version 1.02 corrects the above bug, but is only compatible with NDOS's /U and /E:nnnnU options if Microsoft's HIMEM.SYS is also loaded in your system. MOVE-EM itself does not fully support the XMS specification which permits NDOS to load itself and the master environment in high memory. See the general section on /U and /E:nnnnU above for more information. MTEZ Fax Software: [**] When this software is loaded it leaves a "hole" in memory which can cause "Out of memory" errors when NDOS's DIR command is used on directories with more than 128 files. The manufacturer is working on reducing or eliminating this "hole" in order to resolve the problem. Netware (Novell): [**] The information below was obtained from tests with Netware versions 2.12 and 2.15 and Netware 386, and from discussions with Novell support personnel. On some Netware systems you may experience problems when redirecting output to network disk drives (for example, DIR > J:DIRLIST). The problems occur because Netware has a tendency to close files which are still in use by NDOS, despite the considerable extent to which NDOS has been modified to meet Novell's requirements to avoid this problem. The problem does not occur on most networks. If you do experience it, the only solution we are currently aware of is to place the following line in your Netware SHELL.CFG file: TaskMode=4 This will disable Netware's "task cleanup" facility, which is the part of Netware that is closing files and causing the problem. CAUTION: Be advised that if this option is used, some poorly behaved applications which do not properly close their files will no longer have Netware to clean up after them. This may lead to files being left open when such applications exit, and the next time the files are used sharing violations may then occur. A system reboot will clean up any such problem. Please contact technical support if you are unable to resolve problems with redirection on Netware drives. When Netware's LOGIN and/or MAP commands are used to map network drives into the path, the local path will be lost if it is not stored in uppercase. The NDOS PATH command always shifts its input to uppercase to get around this problem. However if you use SET to modify the path you can still manage to include lowercase characters, and thereby exercise this Netware bug. Novell has informed us that they intend to fix this problem in an upcoming release. In the meantime, keep your PATH environment variable entirely in uppercase to avoid the problem. Netware also has a bug which can cause it to lose one or more characters from the name of an environment variable (usually 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. Another possible technique is to install 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. It is not currently possible to do disk swapping to a network drive under Netware. This is because Netware closes all files -- including the NDOS swap file -- each time an application exits. The next time NDOS uses the swap file, a swap file seek error will occur. We are considering possible internal workarounds for this problem; for now the available methods are to swap to EMS, XMS, or a local hard disk or RAM disk. Use caution with the NDOS UNSET command under Netware. When Netware 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 NDOS /U command line option is reported to be compatible with Netware, but the /E:nnnnU and /E:nnnnS options are not. Novell MENU (Novell): The Novell MENU system distributed with Netware uses Interrupt 2E to execute menu options, and therefore requires the use of the NDOS2E program to work properly. NDOS2E is included with NDOS; see the general section above on INT 2E and the NDOS2E documentation in the manual for more information. When using MENU with NDOS2E, remember that a secondary NDOS shell will be started to execute each command in the menu file. This can be quite slow if you execute many commands for each menu option, and it won't work if you use SET commands whose results are used later in the command sequence. However if you put the commands in a batch file and put the name of the batch file as the command to be executed for each menu option then there should be no performance problems, and the results of SET commands will be available to commands that occur later in the batch file. OmniMouse Software Drivers: [**] The OmniMouse TSR driver, MSCMOUSE.COM, works correctly with NDOS. The CONFIG.SYS driver, MSCMOUSE.SYS, may not. If you have trouble with MSCMOUSE.SYS use MSCMOUSE.COM instead. QEMM and QRAM (Quarterdeck): The information below was obtained from tests with QEMM versions 4 and 5, and beta tester reports on QRAM. Both QEMM 5.0 and QRAM are compatible with NDOS, and will allow you to load the NDOS resident code and the master environment into high DOS memory (UMBs) via the /U and /E:nnnnU switches respectively. For /U and /E:nnnnU to work with QRAM you must have QEXT loaded also (this is the normal method of loading QRAM). See general information on these switches above as well. QEMM version 5 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 values displayed by the NDOS MEMORY command -- they will be exactly the same under QEMM 5. Just remember that if both values are (say) 512K, that means you have 512K of free memory which can be allocated 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 NDOS to hang during boot, especially if disk swapping is used. If you use QEMM's OPTIMIZE and your AUTOEXEC has NDOS-specific commands like GLOBAL, IFF, aliases, etc., OPTIMIZE will not recognize them as DOS commands. Instead, it will act as if these commands are actually programs being invoked and attempt to see whether they should be loaded high. This can confuse OPTIMIZE and make it either fail, or run much too long. To address this, run OPTIMIZE with the switch /LOADHIONLY and then place a LOADHI command before each entry in AUTOEXEC that you actually want OPTIMIZE to examine. SideKick 2.0 (Borland): If you use NDOS disk swapping with the initial release of SideKick 2.0 you may receive swap file seek errors when unloading SideKick from memory. This is because on unload Sidekick erroneously closes some files which do not belong to it, including the NDOS swap file. This is a bug in SideKick which is being addressed by Borland. In the meantime, you can unload SideKick with no trouble using a TSR manager. SideKick 2.0 can also cause NDOS to hang if it is popped up over a secondary NDOS shell (for example, when shelled out of your word processor or communications program). The problem only occurs when popping SideKick up in a secondary shell with a relatively small amount of memory available. We are working with Borland to determine the cause of this problem and resolve it. To work around the problem, run a small application program and pop SideKick up over that program, or return to the original application from which you shelled to DOS and pop SideKick up there. SigmaPlot (Sigma Designs): [**] The batch file PLOT.BAT used to start SigmaPlot uses an outdated method of determining DOS version which will fail under NDOS, 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 (DosVer3, DosVer4, and so on). Software Carousel (SoftLogic Solutions): Please see the section on multitaskers under General Information above before reading this section. The information below was obtained from tests with Software Carousel version 3, and discussions with SoftLogic technical support. It is reported to apply to all versions of Software Carousel through 5.0. Neither Software Carousel nor DoubleDOS will work properly with NDOS loaded as the primary shell. Both programs are written with the assumption that COMMAND.COM is the system command processor, and both contain logic which specifically depends on COMMAND.COM and the way it is written, and which actually modifies the copy of COMMAND.COM in memory. This makes it impossible to write a program which works properly as an alternate command processor loaded underneath (i.e., before) these products. However, NDOS can be run without difficulty inside a Software Carousel partition, and should work properly as a program to be run under DoubleDOS. When loading NDOS into a Carousel partition, the best method is to leave the COMSPEC set to COMMAND.COM when Carousel is loaded. NDOS should then be set up in the Carousel options file just like any other program. For example, to load NDOS into partition 1: d:\path\NDOS.COM [parameters] [filename] where: d:\path is the drive and path where NDOS.COM is located [parameters] is the NDOS command line parameters (/S, /E, etc.; do NOT use /P here) [filename] is the name of a batch file to be executed when the partition is started Because NDOS can only be loaded in a partition when running Software Carousel, and not as the primary command processor, using NDOS disk swapping in multiple partitions is subject to the cautionary note on this subject in the general information section on multitaskers; please read it carefully. Telix Communications Software: Telix will work properly with NDOS. However because Telix uses all available EMS memory, this memory will not be available for NDOS swapping when you shell to DOS from Telix. As a result, if you have set NDOS up to swap secondary shells to EMS (e.g., with SET NDSHELL=/S:E) then EMS swapping in a secondary shell from Telix will fail, and NDOS will load resident. If you allow NDOS to determine the swapping method itself for secondary shells, then it will swap to disk (unless XMS is available). This isn't a problem -- it's just different from what you may see if you shell to DOS from other programs that don't take all available EMS. TSRCOM Utilities (TurboPower Software): TSRCOM will work properly with NDOS as long as you use TSRCOM version 2.6 or later. The current release is version 2.9, and is available on many bulletin boards and on-line systems. If you use TSRCOM's MARK and RELEASE to manage your TSRs, NDOS 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. UltraVision (Personics): [**] When using NDOS and Personics' UltraVision 2.0, you may need to have an NSTART.BAT (or .BTM) that contains a SETDOS /S command to set the cursor shape, or your cursor may disappear. The proper cursor start and end values depend to some extent on the UV line size, but all values less than 14 appear to work in all UV line sizes. The DE program distributed with UltraVision is written specifically for COMMAND.COM, and cannot currently be used to set directory colors with NDOS. If you load UltraVision inside a Microsoft Windows 3.0 window which was started with NDOS, and don't unload it before EXITing, then when you do EXIT Windows will display a message that a popup program has been activated. Type Ctrl-C when this message appears to close the window and return to Windows. Ventura Publisher (Xerox): [**] Ventura Publisher 2.0 may issue an Error 0019 if there is more than about 180 bytes of space in use in your environment (use the MEMORY command to determine the amount of environment space in use). This is a bug in Ventura Publisher, and not a problem in NDOS. For Ventura 2.0 you may need to use a batch file which removes some of your environment variables to make the environment small enough. For example, the following batch file uses SETLOCAL to preserve the current environment, removes some variables, runs Ventura, and then restores the environment with ENDLOCAL: setlocal unset bpath bflags bpackages wp pcplus [commands to run Ventura publisher] endlocal VTSR (Golden Bow Systems): [**] Version 2.0 of VTSR will work properly with NDOS. Some earlier versions may report (incorrectly) that no TSRs are installed. Windows 3.0 (Microsoft): When the instructions below are followed NDOS will work properly with Windows 3.0 in all modes. The standard "DOS" icon provided with Windows is set up to run COMMAND.COM, regardless of your COMSPEC setting. To run NDOS, either go into the Program Manager's File/Properties menu selection for the DOS icon and change the command line entry to refer to NDOS; or create a new DOS icon (take the File/New menu selection, then choose "Program Item") with the name "NDOS" and a command line which refers to NDOS. In either case the command line should include the full path and filename for NDOS.COM, plus any switches you wish to set (swapping, alias and environment size, etc.). When creating an NDOS icon, you may wish to set up a .PIF file instead of simply using the File Properties screen. A .PIF file will give you more control over how NDOS is set up and started. To associate a .PIF file for NDOS with a Program Manager icon set up as described in the previous paragraphs, first set up the .PIF file itself (using the PIF editor from the Accessories screen), then set up the icon as described above, placing the full path and name of the .PIF file into the command line field instead of the path and name for NDOS.COM. When running in 386 enhanced mode, you can run NDOS in a window that's smaller than the full screen. All NDOS commands, including "full screen" commands like LIST and SELECT, will work properly in such a window. To invoke this option you must set up a NDOS .PIF file, and set the "Windowed" (as opposed to "Full Screen") flag in the PIF editor. This flag is visible only when running the PIF editor in 386 enhanced mode. 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. Since NDOS allows you to create a PATH up to 255 characters long this can appear to be a conflict between Windows and NDOS. You can solve the problem by reducing your PATH length before running Setup Applications. To do so you must exit Windows, reduce the PATH length, restart Windows, run Setup Applications, exit Windows again, restore the original PATH, and restart Windows again. You can easily set up the Windows File Manager so that it will consider BTM files to be "executable." Just open your WIN.INI file with any editor, and find the section labeled "[extensions]". Add the following line to the end of the section: btm=c:\norton\ndos.com /c ^.btm (adjust this to show the proper path for NDOS.COM on your system). It is NOT possible to execute BTM files from the Program Manager by modifying the Programs= setting in WIN.INI; in fact, if you try to do so, the system will hang when you attempt to actually invoke a BTM file. WordPerfect 5.1 (WordPerfect Corp. ): [**] Early releases of WordPerfect 5.1 had a variety of problems in the way they accessed expanded (EMS) memory, and therefore may conflict with NDOS's EMS swapping. Symptoms of the conflict include incorrect response to keystrokes, and system hangs. If you have a problem with WordPerfect 5.1 and NDOS when using NDOS's EMS swapping, try changing to disk swapping. If this resolves the problem, you can probably solve it permanently by upgrading to a later release of version 5.1. ---------------------------------------------------------------------