QuickLink Documentation (C) Copyright Daniel Doman 1986, 1987, 1988 166 East 96th Street New York, N.Y. 10128 QuickLink is copyrighted by, and is the sole property of Daniel B. Doman. You are hereby granted a single user license to use QuickLink. You may not modify QuickLink, resell, or otherwise charge for its use without violating this license. What QuickLink Is QuickLink is a network mapping utility. It sets and resets network device redirection. All network operating systems supply similar utilities, but they are usually not as fast, and flexible, and the utilities from one network operating system cannot work on another network operating system. QuickLink can work in just about any local area network. It has been tested under IBM, Novell, Vines, 3Com, Waterloo, and Network-OS. Most network mapping utilities can map one item at a time, but QuickLink can perform several operations from one command line. You can map both directories and shared printers from the same command line. QuickLink has been designed to be as small and fast as possible. There is scant online help. It is intended for the experienced network user. The command line syntax is necessarily terse. This documentaion does not attempt to teach local area network theory. It assumes that you already understand basic operations. How To Use QuickLink Compound Commands You can give multiple commands to QuickLink by separating each command with a semicolon. You can string as many commands together as DOS will permit on a command line. Linking The basic syntax of all network redirection is "map this local `thing' to that network 'thing'. The local `thing' is the name of a local device such as a drive letter or a printer device such as LPT1: or PRN. The network `thing' is the sharename created by such and such a network server. The verb to redirect something varies from one network manufacturer to another. Some say "MAP", some say "USE" and others say "LINK". They all mean the same thing. An example of IBM mapping syntax is shown below: Net Use E: \\NETSRVR\PROGRAMS Net Use F: \\NETSRVR\DATA Net Use PRN \\NETSRVR\PRINTER1 Net Use The Equivalent QuickLink syntax is below QL E: \\NETSRVR\PROGRAMS; F: \\NETSRVR\DATA; PRN \\NETSRVR\PRINTER1; -L Most network utilities will complain if you try to link a network sharename to a local device which is already linked to something. If the local name that you are linking the network sharename to is already linked to something, QuickLink will automatically delete it. QuickLink can link both directory and printer sharenames on the same command line. Some networks such as 3Com and Novell require separate utilities to map printers and directory sharenames. Each network utility has slightly different syntax, but QuickLink uses the same syntax on all networks. Passwords If a sharename has a password, you must supply the password on your command line. QuickLink will simply return an error if the password is missing or incorrect. It is also an error to give a password where none was required. Below is an example of linking to a network sharename with a password. QL F: \\NETSERVER\SECRET Yomomma Listing Current Links To list current redirection (mapping), you give QuickLink a "-L" on the command line. If you feel more comfortable spelling out -LIST you can, but QuickLink only cares about the first letter. The command above might thus look like: QL E: \\NETSRVR\PROGRAMS; F: \\NETSRVR\DATA; PRN \\NETSRVR\PRINTER1; -L Deleting Links Deleting a network Link is easy. Just give the local device name and then a "/d" for delete. For example: QL D: /D; PRN /d; E: /d; LPT1 /d QuickLink will not complain if you delete redirection from a local device that was not in fact redirected. The net result will be the same - the local device is no longer redirected. An older version of QuickLink used an exclamation point instead of the "/d" switch, and this version of QuickLink accepts that syntax as well. For example: QL D: !; PRN !; E: !; LPT1 ! Deleting All Links You can delete all active network links by giving an asterisk for the local device name. Below is an example.. QL * /d Mapping To A Novell Network Most people do not realize that Novell networks maintain IBM compatible sharenames. Sometimes the sharenames are not obvious. You can get a better feel for the sharenames that Novell uses if you LIST your current links after logging in. The shared printers on a Novell server are typically called PTR0, PTR1, and so forth. Once you understand the IBM style sharenames that the Novell server has generated, you can use QuickLink instead of the more cumbersome Novell utilities. The syntax to see your current network links is below: QL -L Mapping To A Vines Network Banyan Vines networks maintain IBM style sharenames and redirection tables. The naming conventions are the same as Vines "StreetTalk" names. The trick in discerning the IBM style name is the same as for a Novell network. Link to some drives and printers, and then LIST your links to see what the IBM style sharenames are. Mapping To A 3Com Network 3Com networks use a naming scheme that is almost identical to the IBM style. One 3Com oddity that QuickLink demonstrates is that there is no real security in a 3Com network. You can continue to link to network sharenames even AFTER logging OFF of the 3Com network! What is really frightening is that you can link to objects that you should not be able to access. Enough said about this! Making QuickLink Quiet If you want to put QuickLink into "quiet" mode, just redirect its output to NUL. For example: QL d: \\NETSERVER\FILES; PRN \\NETSERVER\NETPRN >NUL