Computer Help References version 1.19.95 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ M S - D O S ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ As new information is added, it will appear at the beginning of each specific section. All new information will have the date it was added in the header. If you find something you've read before that is marked as a new addition, it is due to a correction, or addition to that topic. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Updating Time and Date Stamps on Files ====================================== -> Added on January 3, 1995 If you'd like to update the date/time stamp on your files, the following simple DOS command will update all the files in your current directory to your current system's date and time. for %x in (*.*) do copy /b %x+,, Before you run the above command set the date and time on your system to whatever you wish, change to your DOS directory, run the command above, and then change the date and time back to current. The "/b" (binary) parameter is extremely important. It tells DOS to ignore the end-of-file character (ASCII character 26) and copy the entire file. The "+,," on the end of the command forces DOS to copy a file in place without returning the error message: File cannot be copied onto itself 0 file(s) copied (BTW, the "COPY /B filename.ext+,," command is documented in old DOS manuals as far back as v3.nn). * Vernon.Frazee@f71.n135.z1.fidonet.org or FidoNet: 1:135/71 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ MS-DOS Error Levels on Various Commands ======================================= -> Added on January 3, 1995 COMMAND: ERROR- DOS MEANING: LEVEL: VER. ------- ------ --- ---------------------------------------------- BACKUP 0 3.2+ The backup was successful. 1 " No files were found to back up. 2 " Some files were not backed up because of file-sharing conflicts. 3 " The user pressed CTRL+C to stop the process. 4 " The process stopped because of an error. DISKCOMP 0 4.01+ The disks are the same. 1 " Differences were found. 2 " The user pressed CTRL+C to stop the process. 3 " A hard error occurred. 4 " An initialization error occurred. DISKCOPY 0 4.01+ The copy operation was successful. 1 " A nonfatal read/write error occurred. 2 " The user pressed CTRL+C to stop the process. 3 " A fatal hard error occurred, unable to read the source disk or format the target disk. 4 " An initialization error occurred. There is not enough memory - invalid drives or command line syntax. FIND 0 6.0 At least one occurence has been found. 1 " No occurence has been found. 2 " The search was not completed, due to break or error. FORMAT 0 3.2+ The format operation was successful. 3 " The user pressed CTRL+C to stop the process. 4 " A fatal error occurred (any error other than 0,3, or 5) 5 " The user pressed N in response to the prompt "Proceed with Format (Y/N)?" to stop the process. GRAFTABL 0 4.01+ Character set was loaded successfully; no previous code page was loaded. 1 " Character set was already loaded and replaced by new table. 2 " A file error occurred. 3 " An incorrect parameter was specified; no action was taken. 4 " An incorrect version of MS-DOS is in use; version 5.0 is required. KEYB 0 5.0+ Keyboard definition file was loaded successfully. 1 " Invalid keyboard code, code page, or syntax was used. 2 " Keyboard definition file is bad or missing. 4 " An error occurred while communicating with the CON device. 5 " The requested code page has not been prepared. REPLACE 0 4.01+ Replace successfully replaced or added the files. 1 " Command line error. 2 3.2+ Replace could not find the source files. 3 " Replace could not find the source or destination path. 5 " The user does not have access to the files you want to replace. 8 " There is insufficient system memory to carry out the command. 11 " The user used the wrong syntax on the command line. 15 4.01 Invalid drive. Other " Standard MS-DOS error. RESTORE 0 3.2+ Restore successfully restored the file or files. 1 " Restore could not find the files to restore. 2 3.2 Some files not restored due to sharing conflicts. 3 3.2+ The user pressed CTRL+C to stop the restoring operation. 4 " Restore stopped because of an error. SETVER 0 5 Only Setver successfully completed its task. 1 " The user specified an invalid command switch. 2 " The user specified an invalid filename. 3 " There is insufficient system memory to carry out the command. 4 " The user specified an invalid version-number format. 5 " Setver could not find the specified entry in the version table. 6 " Setver could not find the SETVER.EXE file. 7 " The user specified an invalid drive. 8 " The user specified too many command-line parameters. 9 " Setver detected missing command-line parameters. 10 " Setver detected an error while reading the SETVER.EXE file. 11 " The SETVER.EXE file is corrupt. 12 " The specified SETVER.EXE file does not support a version table. 13 " There is insufficient space in the version table for a new entry. 14 " Setver detected an error while writing to the SETVER.EXE file. XCOPY 0 4.01+ Files were copied without error. 1 " No files were found to copy. 2 4.01 Control+C entered by user to terminate xcopy. 3 5.0 The user pressed CTRL+C to terminate xcopy. 4 4.01+ Initialization error occurred. There is not enough memory or disk space, or you entered an invalid drive name or invalid syntax on the command line. 5 4.01 Int 24 error occurred. The user aborted from INT 24 error reading or writing disk. 5 5.0 Disk write error occurred. It is known that MS-DOS 6.x returns errorlevels for several other DOS utilities. These include: CHKDSK; CHOICE; DEFRAG; DELTREE; MOVE; MSAV; and SCANDISK. Please refer to MS-DOS online HELP for further details. If anyone knows of any other MS-DOS commands which return errorlevels, or has additional information regarding those listed here. I would appreciate a message with detailed information. This will permit me to update this list and publish ERRLVL12.TXT! * gary.cooper.@f15.n255.z1.fidonet.org or FidoNet: 1:255\15.0 and 1:255\12.0 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Undocumented and Obscure Features MS-DOS ======================================== -> Added on January 3, 1995 -------- TRUENAME -------- Internal DOS 5.0 command. Canonicalize a filename or path (using DOS interrupt 21h, function 60) prints the actual directory. Syntax: TRUENAME filename - Prints the complete path to file. TRUENAME directory - Prints the complete path to directory. Note: If the path is in a network, it starts with a \\machine-name. TRUENAME is analogous to the UNIX "whence" command. It returns the real fully-qualified path name for a command. TRUENAME is useful in networks, where a physical drive may be mapped to a logical volume, and the user needs to know the physical location of the file. It ignores the DOS SUBST and JOIN commands, or network MAPped drives. TRUENAME is an undocumented MS-DOS feature, but it is documented in JP Software's 4DOS software (COMMAND.COM replacement) as follows: Syntax: TRUENAME [d:][path]filename Purpose: Returns a fully qualified filename. Comments: TRUENAME will see "through" JOIN and SUBST commands, and requires MS-DOS 3.0 or above. Example: The following command uses TRUENAME to get the true pathname for a file: c:\>subst d: c:\util\test c:\>truename d:\test.exe c:\util\test\test.exe TRUENAME : will reveal the full name drive and path of the filename. If you specify a wildcard (*) in the filename, it will expand the filename to use question marks instead. If the path includes the ..\ sequence, TRUENAME will examine the directory structure and calculate the path. Stranger still, the line: TRUENAME \CRONK\FLIBBET\..\ART ...produces the response: C:\CRONK\ART ...even if the directories \CRONK\FLIBBET and the file ART don't exist! Don't expect this command to work well across networks. After all, this is still undocumented in MS-DOS for a reason! ------------- FDISK /STATUS ------------- Prints a screen just like using option 4 of FDISK, "Partition information", but includes extended partition information. Nice if you want to get an overview without fear of pressing the wrong keys. Doesn't work in DOS 3.30. ---------- FDISK /MBR ---------- MS-DOS 5.0 FDISK has an undocumented parameter, /MBR, that causes it to write the master boot record to the hard disk without altering the partition table information. While this feature is not documented, it can be told to customers on a need-to-know basis. Warning: Writing the master boot record to the hard disk in this manner can make certain hard disks partitioned with SpeedStor unusable. It can also cause problems for some dual-boot programs, or for disks with more than 4 partitions. Specific information is below. What is the MBR? At the end of the ROM BIOS bootstrap routine, the BIOS will read and execute the first physical sector of the first floppy or hard drive on the system. This first sector of the hard disk is called the master boot record, or sometimes the partition table or master boot block. At the beginning of this sector of the hard disk is a small program. At the end of this sector is where the partition information, or partition table, is stored. This program uses the partition information to determine which partition is bootable (usually the first primary DOS partition) and attempts to boot from it. This program is what is written to the disk by FDISK /MBR and is usually called the master boot record. During normal operation, FDISK only writes this program to the disk if there is no master boot record. Why is the MBR changed during Setup? During installation of Microsoft MS-DOS 5 Upgrade, Setup will replace the master boot record on the hard disk with code to display the message: The MS-DOS 5.0 Setup was not completed. Insert the UNINSTALL #1 diskette in drive A. Press the ENTER key to continue. This message should be erased and the master boot code rewritten before Setup is completed. If a problem occurs during Setup and you return to the previous MS-DOS, UNINSTAL should also remove this message. However, should Setup or UNINSTAL fail to remove this message, or should the master boot record become corrupted, a new master boot record can be written to the disk using the following command: C:\>fdisk /mbr WARNINGS: This option should not be used if: - the disk was partitioned using Storage Dimensions' SpeedStor utility with its /Bootall option - more than 4 partitions exist - certain dual-boot programs are in use Storage Dimensions' SpeedStor utility using the /Bootall option redefines the drive's physical parameters (cylinder, head, sector). /BOOTALL stores information on how the drive has been changed in an area of the master boot record that MS-DOS does not use. FDISK /MBR will erase that information, making the disk unusable. Some older OEM versions of MS-DOS and some third-party partitioning utilities can create more than 4 partitions. Additional partition information is commonly stored information on partitions in an area that FDISK /MBR will overwrite. Some dual-boot programs have a special MBR that asks the user which operating system they want on bootup. FDISK /MBR erases this program. Dual-boot systems that boot whichever partition is marked Active are not affected by FDISK /MBR. If you have a Boot Sector Virus, just boot from a known "clean" floppy disk that's write protected and which has FDISK on it, and run FDISK /MBR. -------------------------- SHELL=C:\COMMAND.COM /P /F -------------------------- The /F in the CONFIG.SYS SHELL= statement forces a "Fail" response to all "Abort, Retry, Fail" prompts issued by the DOS critical error handler. ---------- COMMAND /F ---------- Entered on the command line, COMMAND /F makes all those annoying "Abort, Retry, Ignore, Fail" disk error messages default to "Fail" from then on until rebooting. ---------- COMMAND /P ---------- For DOS 3.30 (not checked with other versions): Docs say that this doesn't allow you to exit back to the previous shell, but /P also forces AUTOEXEC.BAT to be run on secondary shells. ---------- COMMAND /D ---------- When used with a primary shell, or secondary with /P, prevents execution of AUTOEXEC.BAT. ------ VER /R ------ Yields extended information about the DOS version: MS-DOS Version 5.00 Revision A DOS is in HMA Doesn't work with DOS 3.30. VER /R is a documented feature of JP Software's 4DOS. -------------------- ECHO OFF and ECHO ON -------------------- Entering ECHO OFF from the command line erases the prompt and leaves just a cursor on the screen. ECHO ON from the command line restores the prompt. This works with all version of DOS. One of the most frequently asked questions is "How do I ECHO a blank line in a batch file?" The most common answer is to use ECHO directly followed by a period: ECHO. like so. However, just about any "white space" character will work, as well as any "delimiter". The following alternatives can be used: ECHO. ECHO" ECHO, ECHO: ECHO; ECHO[ ECHO] etc. Apparently it's just the way that the command handles the delimiter and has been available from way back! Microsoft just began mentioning it in the documentation recently, though, and their examples use a period. ---------------- FORMAT /AUTOTEST ---------------- The autotest parameter will allow FORMAT to proceed, checking the existing format of the disk (unless the /U parameter with DOS 5 or 6 is also present), and proceeding with the format. All this will take place with no delay and no waiting for user input. It will also end without pausing. It will not ask for a volume label or whether to format another diskette. WARNING! This procedure will also work on hard drives! Be very cautious if you plan to use this feature! -------------- FORMAT /BACKUP -------------- This works exactly like /AUTOTEST, but it does ask for a volume label. -------------- FORMAT /SELECT -------------- This is like the DOS MIRROR command... For safety-fanatics only. ----------------- FORMAT /SELECT /U ----------------- Just makes a disk unreadable. Guess it could be handy? --------- FORMAT /H --------- In DOS 3.30 (not tested with other versions), FORMAT /H will cause the format to begin immediately after pressing Y in response to "Format another", rather than displaying "Place disk to be formatted in drive x: and press Enter" on a second and subsequent disks. In DOS 5.0, FORMAT reports "invalid switch". ---------------------------------------------------------------- IF EXIST \NUL and IF EXIST EMMXXXX0 ---------------------------------------------------------------- This is a handy quirk of DOS. Installable drivers are seen as files in all directories. You can use the if exist test to either test for the existence of a directory, with "if exist \nul", which fails if the directory does not exist because the nul device is not found; or to test whether any driver is loaded, such as the DOS 5 or 6 EMM386 memory manager. Caveats: For testing NUL, you need to know the name of the directory or the driver whose existence you are testing, and this is MS-DOS specific -- it doesn't work on network drives, and may not work under DR-DOS. Where did you learn the "EMMXXXX0" name from? Instead of typing MEM /C, type MEM /D for the "debug" listing. The only trouble is EXISTS returns true for COM3/4 and LPT2/3 even if the hardware does not exist. -------------------------------- Using ATTRIB to hide directories -------------------------------- The DOS 5.0 and 6.0 ATTRIB command can do the same thing for directories as it can for files: ATTRIB +H will hide the named directory. ----------- SWITCHES=/W ----------- Enables you to have the Windows 3.0 WINA20.386 file anywhere on your boot drive. Without this you have to have it in the root directory. This should not be used with Windows 3.1, since it appears to waste around 120K of UMBs. ----------------------- FOR %%V IN (/SOMETHING) ----------------------- How can a batch file (without 4DOS) determine from which drive it has been started? Example: C:\>a:test.bat Now my batch should be able to find out that it is located on drive A: (not the path, only the drive!). In a batch file, the variable %0 contains the name of the batch file as it was typed at the command line. If you run the batch file as A:TEST.BAT, %0 will be "A:TEST.BAT". If you have the directory on your path, and simply type TEST, then %0 will be "TEST". The drive, path, and extension will only appear in %0 if you enter them in the command used to call the batch file (either typed at the command line, or called from another batch file). So, you must specify the drive as part of the batch filename for this to work. To extract the drive only from %0, use the undocumented FOR %%V in /SOMETHING command: set drive= for %%v in (/%0) do call test2 %%v echo Calling drive is %drive% ...where TEST2.BAT is: if not '%drive%'=='' set drive=%1: FOR %%V IN (/SOMETHING) DO WHATEVER will do WHATEVER twice -- the first time with %%V set to the first character in SOMETHING ("S"), the second time with all the remaining characters in SOMETHING ("OMETHING"). If SOMETHING is only a single character, WHATEVER will only be called once, with that character in %%V. If the single character is a wildcard (? or *) that wild card will not be expanded to a set of filenames. (The main purpose of this feature is apparently to allow inclusion of the literal characters "?" and "*" without them being expanded.) This works in DOS 3.30 and later. ---- DIR, ---- Using a comma immediately after DIR shows ALL files, including the HIDDEN ones. This appears only to work with DOS 5.0 and 6.0. With 3.30, it doesn't display either IO.SYS, MSDOS.SYS (both with S, H and R attribs) or a test file with A and H attribs. With DOS 5.0, it displayed a test file with H and A, but would not display IO.SYS or MSDOS.SYS with S, H and R. This isn't surprising actually, since S alone (without H) will prevent inclusion of a file in a normal DIR. Not tested with DOS 4.x. Not supported by JP Software's 4DOS. -------- COPY. A: -------- The use of a period IMMEDIATELY after some DOS statements will work just like *.* Examples: DEL. (erase all files in current directory) COPY. A: (copy all files in current directory to A:) There may be more statements with which it works. This is actually a documented although obscure feature, though the ability to use the period with COPY is not documented. What is documented is the fact that "." and ".." can be used to represent the current and parent directories respectively, and these will work with many applications which can handle directory names as arguments. In this case the "." could also be viewed as a replacement for "*.*" --------- DOS?=HIGH --------- DOS?=HIGH in CONFIG.SYS with DOS 6.0 will prompt you whether to load the DOS kernel high (into the HMA) or not. ----------- INSTALLHIGH ----------- In DOS 6.0, there is an undocumented CONFIG.SYS command called INSTALLHIGH= which works just like INSTALL= but loads the TSR high (into upper memory). The only drawback to this is that MemMaker will not touch INSTALLHIGH lines during the optimizing process. It just takes it as it is currently. But then again, INSTALL= is ignored too. All in all, INSTALL and INSTALLHIGH really are commands to set up manually by the user, and are not really recommended for normal use. Load TSRs at the beginning of AUTOEXEC.BAT (and using LOADHIGH if desired). Example: DOS=HIGH,UMB DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS DEVICE=C:\DOS\EMM386.EXE NOEMS INSTALLHIGH=C:\DOS\SHARE.EXE ------------------------------- Using : for batch file comments ------------------------------- DOS uses a leading : to indicate a label in a batch file. If the next character following the : is a space or other non-alphanumeric character, then DOS will decide it's an invalid label and skip to the next line, performing no further action. Faster batch file processing is achieved using this method for comments instead of REM commands. -------------------------------------- REM in lines with pipes or redirection -------------------------------------- For example: REM echo y | del *.* Problems are encountered when trying to REM out an "echo y | del *.*" line in a batch file. The problem appears to only occur if there is a pipe or redirection in the REMed out line, which shows that DOS first reads the entire line and processes pipes and redirections first, and then goes back to find out what to do with them in the line. It's actually doing what it thinks you've told it: Piping the output of REM to DEL. Since REM has no output, DEL hangs, waiting for the answer to its question. ------------------- Delimiter character ------------------- Prior to DOS 5.0, there was an undocumented DOS function that would allow you to set the DOS option delimiter character to something else, like a dash (-). Once you did this, you could use either \ or / in PATH specifications. DOS 5.0 removed the function to set the option delimiter, but retained the function to query what it currently is. (Unfortunately, no further details were provided in this file, so not sure if the delimiter character can still be changed somehow.) * jamie.hermans@tech-spk.alive.ampr.ab.ca or FidoNet: Jamie Hermans @ 1:342/707 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Speed-Up Keyboard Entry ======================= -> Added on October 30, 1994 Enter the following line in your AUTOEXEC.BAT or at the DOS prompt to speed up keyboard response time when holding down any repeating key. C:\DOS\MODE.COM CON RATE=32 DELAY=1 * jamie.hermans@tech-spk.alive.ampr.ab.ca or FidoNet: Jamie Hermans @ 1:342/707 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Renaming Directories ==================== -> Added on October 30, 1994 Ever wonder why you gave a directory such a cryptic name? Don't want to go through the hassle of copying everything to a new directory and deleting the old one just to change the name? Use DOS 6.0+'s new MOVE command. MOVE C:\OLD-DIR C:\NEW-DIR The above will rename OLD-DIR to NEW-DIR without touching the files inside. * jamie.hermans@tech-spk.alive.ampr.ab.ca or FidoNet: Jamie Hermans @ 1:342/707 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Installing MS-DOS ================= -> Added on October 30, 1994 Maybe you've found yourself in this situation. You buy a new computer and of course it comes with MS-DOS 6.0 on it, but no disks. You get the stepup upgrade for free from your local BBS or from the MSDL service. Everything's okey dokey! One day for some reason you format the HD and want to re-install everything from scratch. Whoops!! MS-DOS stepup says it's only intended for computers that already have a copy of DOS on it. What next? You don't have the original disks, so do you have to go and buy an OEM copy of MS-DOS? NO! Save your money and follow these steps. Boot up with disk 1 of the Stepup set. When you get to the opening screen, press "F3" to exit to DOS. If you need to set up partitions, run FDISK.EXE. If you make any changes, the computer will reboot ... leave the disk in and go back to the beginning of this paragraph. Type "FORMAT C: /S /U" This will format drive C: unconditionally (doesn't leave an Undelete file sitting around) and write the system files to the drive. Once everything is done, simply reboot with disk 1 in the drive and voila. The upgrade version of MS-DOS is tricked into thinking you already have a version of DOS installed and goes happily along it's way. * Terry Laskiwski @ 1:342/14 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Upgrading MS-DOS ================ -> Added on October 30, 1994 If you've ever upgraded MS-DOS, you know it wants you to have two disks ready for backing your current DOS. Point is, you can have it backed up to the hard drive instead saving MUCH time. Simply type "A:SETUP /G" instead of "A:SETUP", and you won't be prompted for disks. Once you've rebooted and eveything is working fine, go to the C:\ prompt and type DELOLDOS -- this removes the old copy of your DOS and you're all finished. Be sure everything works though, once you type DELOLDOS, there's no turning back! * jamie.hermans@tech-spk.alive.ampr.ab.ca or FidoNet: Jamie Hermans @ 1:342/707 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Delete ANYTHING =============== -> Added on October 30, 1994 Have a directory with a bunch of subdirectories that you want to remove? Have a file with some attributes set and don't want to take the time to reverse them? Use MS-DOS 6.0+'s new DELTREE command. It works both on files and directories, regardless of content or attribute. Don't want to be asked for confirmation? Use "DELTREE /Y filename.ext" for a file and "DELTREE /Y dirname" for a directory and it's contents. * PC Computing - August 1994 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Changing Directories ==================== -> Added on October 30, 1994 You have to picture your hard drive as a BIG tree with the root drive being at the top. Each subdirectory you go into is one level down from the previous one, kind of like going to a lower branch on the tree. Picture this in your mind for the next tip. * Bob Miller @ 1:101/535 There are two shortcuts for moving up directory paths. Use "CD.." to go up one level. Use "CD..." to go up two levels. Unfortunately, this doesn't work with four or more periods. To go right to the top (a.k.a. the root directory), type "CD\". * PC Computing - August 1994 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Non-Confirming Delete ===================== -> Added on October 30, 1994 For those times when you KNOW that you want to delete some files and don't want to be asked, use "ECHO Y | DEL *.*" or whatever wildcards / filename you want, and it'll silently remove your files. * PC Computing - August 1994 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ "DIR" Command Line Switches =========================== -> Added on October 30, 1994 , Lists everything in the current directory regardless of attributes /P Pauses after each screenful of information. /W Uses wide list format. /A Displays files with specified attributes. D Directories R Read-only files H Hidden files S System files A Files ready to archive - Prefix meaning "not" /O List by files in sorted order. N By name (alphabetic) S By size (smallest first) E By extension (alphabetic) D By date & time (earliest first) G Group directories first - Prefix to reverse order C By compression ratio (smallest first) /S Displays files in specified directory and all subdirectories. /B Uses bare format (no heading information or summary). /L Uses lowercase. * PC Computing - August 1994 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Clean & Selective Booting ========================= -> Added on October 30, 1994 MS-DOS 6.0+ comes with many new features. One of them reduces the need for a specialized boot disk (SEE THE NOTE BELOW !!). Simply hold down F5 when you see the message "Starting MS-DOS" and CONFIG.SYS & AUTOEXEC.BAT are bypassed. If you only want to skip one line in either startup file, hold F8 and you will be prompted to run each line on a line-by-line basis. NOTE: CONFIG.SYS only is stepped in DOS 6.0 CONFIG.SYS & AUTOEXEC.BAT are stepped in DOS 6.2+ * PC Computing - August 1994 This tip does NOT eliminate the need for a SAFETY boot disk. Although you can create different booting sequences, bypassing the start-up files isn't going to help if COMMAND.COM get corrupted or a virus infects the Master Boot Record (MBR). * Bob Miller @ 1:101/535 ALWAYS make sure you have a bootable disk handy incase of system failure. The simplest way to do this is to type "FORMAT A: /U /S" which formats the disk and transfers the system files to it. You may want to copy other programs like FDISK, FORMAT, SCANDISK, etc. to the disk as well. * jamie.hermans@tech-spk.alive.ampr.ab.ca or FidoNet: Jamie Hermans @ 1:342/707 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Faster Booting ============== -> Added on October 30, 1994 Add the line "SWITCHES=/F" to the top of your CONFIG.SYS to remove a two second delay after the "Starting MS-DOS" message is displayed. This works for DOS 6.0+ only. * PC Computing - August 1994 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Hard-Drive Maintenance ====================== -> Added on October 30, 1994 Here's a simple little batch file to optimize your hard drive. It will run SANDISK which checks and repairs any errors, and finally defragment your hard drive. It's a good idea to run this once a month or so. Any more is redundant and any less may make each session take longer. Of course, it all depends on how much file moving, creating, deleting, etc. you do. This batch file assumes you are using MS-DOS 6.0 or higher, but could change SCANDISK and DEFRAG with your own prefered programs if you wish. ... and obviously DON'T RUN THIS WHILE STILL IN WINDOWS!!! @echo OFF C:\DOS\SCANDISK.EXE /ALL /AUTOFIX /NOSAVE /NOSUMMARY DEL C:\SCANDISK.LOG C:\DOS\DEFRAG.EXE C: /F /SN /H CLS * jamie.hermans@tech-spk.alive.ampr.ab.ca or FidoNet: Jamie Hermans @ 1:342/707 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Expanding Files =============== -> Added on October 30, 1994 If you've ever had to manually expand a file from your Windows or MS-DOS disks, you know there's a lot of typing involved. Usually, you have to use the format ... EXPAND Source Destination Simply add the "-r" option before the source and it will automatically determine the ending filename. This only works for files compressed using the "-r" option, but MS-DOS and Windows are almost always compressed this way. EXPAND -r Source [Destination] In the above example, the destination is optional. This way you could specify a different drive / directory for the destination. If the source is multiple files and -r is not specified, [Destination] must be a directory. Wildcards may not be used for the destination. * jamie.hermans@tech-spk.alive.ampr.ab.ca or FidoNet: Jamie Hermans @ 1:342/707 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ