Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4967 Date: 09-12-93 20:18 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #1 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ The Fabulous #### #### ### ### ########## ##### ##### ### ### ########## ### ## ## ### ### ### ### ### ## ## ### ### ### ######## ### ### ### ### ### ######## ### # ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ## ########## ## ### ## ### ### ## ######## ## ### ## List (MicroSoft's Undocumented Features) Volume 1 Number 6 =============================================================================== 1) 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 Michael Larsson TRUENAME is analogous to the "whence" command in the UNIX Korn shell. It returns the real fully qualified pathname 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. It is an undocumented MS/DOS feature, but is documented in 4DOS as follows: SYNTAX (Internal DOS 5.0 / 4DOS) 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 Dennis McCunney 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 across networks. PC Magazine #212 Pg. 48-49 Forwarded by: Rodney Atkins =============================================================================== ... A feature is a bug with seniority. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4968 Date: 09-12-93 20:19 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #2 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 2) 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. Armin Hanisch Doesn't work in Ver 3.30. Mitch Ames 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. 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 Warning: Writing the master boot record to the hard disk in this manner can make certain hard disks unusable. IE: those partitioned with SpeedStor, or Microhouse's DrivePro program. It can also cause problems for some dual-boot programs, or for disks with more than 4 partitions. Specific information is below. WARNINGS: This option should not be used if: - the disk was partitioned using Storage Dimensions' SpeedStor utility with its /Bootall option - the disk was partitioned using MicroHouse's DrivePro program AND the drive was NOT setup using a standard CMOS value. - 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. MicroHouse's DrivePro program functions similarly to SpeedStor above, and has the same boot record vulnerability. MicroHouse identifies their boot program at boot-up by a small MICROHOUSE logo near the left side of the screen about two-thirds down, at power on. If you see this logo, do NOT use FDISK /MBR, or the drive will become 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. Edited: MicroSoft Publication forwarded by Don Dean editing suggestions made by Matt Mc_Carthy (info re: MicroHouse's DrivePro) ... BUG (n.) An undocumented feature FEATURE (n.) A documented bug. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4969 Date: 09-12-93 20:21 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #3 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 2) FDISK /MBR (Continued) If you have a Boot Sector Virus, just boot from a known "clean" floppy disk (which has the System files and FDISK on it - IE: your "disaster recovery disk") and run FDISK /MBR. Bye, Bye Virus! Gary Cooper Make sure it's write protected .. Jasen Betts [Begin quote] One of the FDISK functions, updating the Master Boot Record (MBR), does not appear on any of the FDISK menus. The Master Boot Record is located at the beginning of your primary fixed disk. It is composed of two parts -- the master boot code and the partition table. The master boot code is a short program that determines which operating system will start the computer, then transfers control to that operating system. The partition table contains information about the partitions located on the fixed disk. The Master Boot Record may need to be updated when: * An operating system other than MS-DOS is on the fixed disk. Some operating systems replace the master boot code with their own program, which may not allow MS-DOS to start the system, even if the partitions are valid DOS partitions. If this condition exists, updating the Master Boot Record will replace only the master boot code. * The information at the beginning of the fixed disk has been overwritten. The partition information is destroyed and the fixed disk will no longer start any operating system. If this condition exists, updating the Master Boot Record will replace both the master boot code and the partition table. However, the partition table will not have any defined partitions. If you cannot get your system to start MS-DOS from the fixed disk and you are sure the initialization process was performed correctly, you may need to update the Master Boot Record. To do this, enter the following command: FDISK /MBR FDISK does not display any menus or messages while it is updating the Master Boot Record. When the procedure is complete, the MS-DOS prompt is displayed. If you are unable to start MS-DOS from the fixed disk after updating the Master Boot Record, you may need to partition and format your fixed disk. If you still cannot use the fixed disk to start MS-DOS, contact your Authorized COMPAQ Computer Dealer for further assistance. [End quote] Compaq DOS 4.01 Manual Submitted by Paul Maserang If the situation at hand involved a trashed partition table. This regenerates the partition table, but does NOT restore the user partition information in it. Therefore, after using FDISK /MBR, you must still use FDISK without the /MBR switch to re-enter the partition information before you can do anything else. If the newly entered partition information is identical to that which existed there prior to the partition table being trashed, and nothing else has been damaged, there should be no need to reformat the drive, because the boot sector, FATs, directories, and data should still be undisturbed. If the boot sector or either of the two hidden system files (IBMBIO.COM/IBMDOS.COM or IO.SYS/MSDOS.SYS) are damaged, the SYS command can be used to restore them without losing anything else. Paul Maserang ... Its not a bug, its an undocumented feature. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4970 Date: 09-12-93 20:23 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #4 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 2) FDISK /MBR (Concluded) Paul, I work _only_ with the Microsoft versions, and have not had the same experience. The /MBR parameter _only_ rewrites the MBR. It does not affect the partition information. I use it daily on various machines and have not lost one byte of data. Matt Mc_carthy I guess you didn't know that "Master Boot Record" and "Partition Table" refer to the same thing. What you're talking about is the master boot CODE, the executable code that accompanies the partition table and is located on the same physical sector (0). Here's what I find in the first few bytes of my physical sector 0 (unassembled with DEBUG after copying the sector to a file): 2BB7:0100 33C0 XOR AX,AX 2BB7:0102 FA CLI 2BB7:0103 BED0 MOV SS,AX 2BB7:0105 BC007C MOV SP,7C00 2BB7:0108 BEC0 MOV ES,AX 2BB7:010A BED8 MOV DS,AX 2BB7:010C FB STI 2BB7:010D 8BF4 MOV SI,SP 2BB7:010F BF0006 MOV DI,0600 2BB7:0112 B90002 MOV CX,0200 2BB7:0115 FC CLD 2BB7:0116 F3 REPZ 2BB7:0117 A4 MOVSB 2BB7:0118 EA1D060000 JMP 0000:061D I also find the following text in the first half of the sector: Missing operating system.Error loading operating system.Invalid partition table.Author - Siegmar Schmidt I have only one partition on my C: drive, and its information is in the last of four possible positions in the partition table. The first significant byte (non-zero) is at offset 01EEh in physical sector 0. The rest, from offset 00EDh to 01EDh is nothing but 00h. So it would appear that everything from offset 0000h to 00ECh is the Master Boot CODE, and everything from 00EDh to the end of the sector (01FFh) is the Master Boot RECORD (aka partition table). More likely, the partition table probably begins at offset 0100h, and takes up the last 256 of the 512 bytes available in the sector. Beginning with the first significant byte of my partition table (at offset 01EEh), this is what mine shows: 80 01 01 04 03 91 65 11 00 00 00 07 A3 00 00 55 AA ^^ This first byte, I think, is the drive on which this partition is located, and the next byte might indicate that this is the first (primary) partition (in my case, the ONLY partition for this drive). Now, according to my manual, FDISK /MBR can either re-write only the Master Boot CODE when necessary; or it can re-write both the Master Boot Code AND the Master Boot RECORD, if it determines that the partition table has been corrupted. If it does re-write both, then you do have to use FDISK without the /MBR switch after using it with the switch, because the re-written partition table has no defined partitions until you do. But when you use the /MBR switch, it produces no screen output (at least not on the version I'm using), so you don't know whether it did both or just the code. So you should still check to see that you have a valid partition by using FDISK without the /MBR switch afterwards. Paul Maserang =============================================================================== ... Life has a lot of undocumented features! ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4971 Date: 09-12-93 20:24 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #5 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 3) SHELL=C:\COMMAND.COM /E:1024 /F /P The /F in your Config.sys SHELL= statement is another undocumented feature. It forces a "Fail" response to the "Abort, Retry, Fail" prompt issued by the DOS critical error handler. Dennis McCunney The /F switch on the SHELL command in CONFIG.SYS will not work in a DESQview environment. The only thing I have found that will is a program called FATAL.COM. Bruce Bowman COMMAND /F Makes all those annoying "Abort, Retry, Ignore, Fail?" disk error messages default to "Fail". Erik Ratcliffe For DOS 3.30 (somebody might care to check these for other versions): COMMAND /P Docs say that this doesn't allow you to exit back to the previous shell (ie /Permanent), 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 Mitch Ames I just checked, and these also both apply to DOS 5.00 Mitch Ames =============================================================================== 4) VER/R Yields extended information about the OS Version. IE: MS-DOS Version 5.00 Revision A DOS is in HMA Billy Gilbreath Doesn't work with DOS 3.30 Mitch Ames =============================================================================== 5) 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 (tested so far!). Michael Larsson One of the most frequently asked questions in the BatPower echo is "How do I ECHO a blank line?" The most common answer is "ECHO." However, I have captured a few posts which expand on the possible answers to this request: Editor's Note ECHO" Paul Welsh just about any white space character will work. Alan Newbery I just found out myself that any delimiter will work here (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. John Whitfield =============================================================================== ... _My_ software never has bugs. It just develops random features... ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4972 Date: 09-12-93 20:26 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #6 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 6) FORMAT FORMAT /H In DOS 3.30 (I don't know about 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 A: and press Enter" on a second and subsequent disks. Mitch Ames On 5.0 it comes back as "invalid switch". John Mudge FORMAT A: /AUTOTEST The autotest parameter will allow format to proceed, checking existing format (unless the /u parameter 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. Wayne Woodman Problem is that it won't take any other switches like /U, /S or /Q which is a bit of a shame really. Peter Lovell With Dos 5 it certainly takes /u and /s as I have used it, in fact I think /u is required if the disk is not pre-formatted as the drive hangs up otherwise. I would agree about /q though, this does not work and gives the error message you quote. Terry Kreft FORMAT/U is not available in DOS 3.30 Mitch Ames FORMAT C: /BACKUP This week I've read some articles in Dutch computer magazines about MUF's which are very interesting (if you don't already know about them). I already knew the FORMAT option /AUTOTEST, but new to me was the /BACKUP option. EXAMPLE: FORMAT A: /BACKUP It seems to work exactly like /AUTOTEST, but it DOES ask for a volume label. Willem Van.den.broek FORMAT/SELECT is like DOS-Mirror ... for safety-fanatics only FORMAT/SELECT/U makes disks unreadable (remember the U) Reinhard Kujawa Info from The German magazine PC PRAXIS FORMAT A: /SPACE On IBM DOS v6.01 the command: FORMAT A: /SPACE puts a 12288 byte file named MIRROR.FIL on the disk ... So, the command: FORMAT A: /U /SPACE just ruins the durn diskette! A subsequent "DIR A:" gives you a: General failure reading drive A Abort, Retry, Fail Vernon Frazee =============================================================================== ... Hidden OLR feature: CTRL-ALT-DEL to view BBS user password file. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4973 Date: 09-12-93 20:28 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #7 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 7) DRIVPARM /c Syntax: DRIVPARM /d:number [/c] [/f:factor] [/h:heads] [/i] [/n] [/s:sectors] [/t:tracks] /d:n refers to the drive NUMBER (0=A:, 1=B:, 2=C:, etc...) of the drive whose parameters you are changing (in your case, it would be 2 for B:). /c is the switch I was referring to for change line support. IF YOU INCLUDE /c, YOU ARE TELLING DOS THAT YOUR COMPUTER *CAN* TELL WHETHER THE DRIVE DOOR HAS BEEN OPENED SINCE THE LAST ACCESS. /i specifies an electronically-compatible 3.5 inch floppy disk-drive. You should use it if your computer's ROM BIOS does NOT support 3.5 floppy diskette drives. /n specifies a NON-removable block device The other parms are similar to DRIVER.SYS IBM Technical Publication Information forwarded by Andrew Barnhardt The '/C' switch doesn't actually check to see if the drive -door- has been opened or not, but it does make another check to see if the disk in there now is different from the one when the drive was last accessed. I have to use that switch with my 5 1/4 floppy because it's an older drive working with a new motherboard (at least that's the explanation I've heard). Andrew Barnhardt Does DRIVPARM return an errorlevel, or give a warning message? Gary Cooper No, not that I'm aware of. You insert the drivparm command in your CONFIG.SYS file. Just DRIVPARM=xx xx ... Andrew Barnhardt =============================================================================== 8) IF EXIST IE: IF EXIST EMMXXXX0 GOTO APPLICATION 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 a driver is loaded. Caveats: you need to know the name of the directory or the driver whose existance you are testing, and this is MS/DOS specific - it doesn't work on network drives, and may not work under DR-DOS. Gary Marden This works definitely under DRDOS: DR DOS Version 6.0 Copyright (c) 1976,1982,1988,1990,1991 Digital Research Inc. Alle Rechte vorbehalten. C:\>if exist emmxxxx0 echo ja ja Wolfram Serber Where did you learn the "EMMXXXX0" name from? Instead of typing MEM /C, type MEM /D for the "debug" listing. That should give the names you're looking for. Erik Ratcliffe The trouble is, EXISTS returns TRUE for COM3/4 and LPT2/3 even though the hardware does not exist. Rudy Lacchin =============================================================================== ... Aha! Another 'undocumented feature'! ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4974 Date: 09-12-93 20:30 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #8 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 9) SWITCHES SWITCHES=/W Enables you to have your WINA20 file anywhere on your boot drive. Without this you have to have it in the root directory. Erik Ratcliffe You should also mention that this one should not be used with Windows 3.1. I've noticed a lot of people who do, and it wastes around 120K of UMBs. George Hannah This is documented in DOS 6.0 Richard Pade SWITCHES=/F Do you know that there is a rarely known switch called /F? If you put this line: SWITCHES=/F as the first line in your CONFIG.SYS, MS-DOS would not delay 2 seconds, but immediately start processing your CONFIG.SYS. This trick has no other effects (AFAIK), but those who DO know better, correct me if I'm wrong! Samuel Tan Yi Hsuen But where would you put the switch, it's not like you load a device driver that early in boot up do you? RF? Beats me. I think it goes in the SHELL= statement. Just don't RF? remember what character you use. I saw it mentioned in the RF? Tech conference /K maybe? No, it's SWITCHES=/F, right? Paul Senechko Actually, its both: /W allows you to move the WINA20.386 file /K makes your AT Keyboard act like a XT /F Disables the wait /N Disables F5/F8 exiting and to use any just put the command SWITCHES= and the parameters on the first line of your config.sys (Can go on other lines, but for the /F and /N you need it at the first line....), also the Switches command IS compatible w/ DOS 5, but only using the /W & /K options John Guillory =============================================================================== 10) FOR IN DO for %%z in (test1 test2 test3) do goto %%z goto end :test1 echo test1 :test2 echo test2 :test3 echo test3 :end When I posted this explaining the traps and pitfalls of FOR IN DO, something got lost. GOTO commands in FOR IN DO statements do not work correctly / as expected. This fragment will work in 4DOS, but not with COMMAND.COM. You've seen what happens when running under COMMAND.COM already. 4DOS will display test1 test2 test3. So, that's what I was trying to explain: that GOTO's don't work right, and that IF's will break FOR IN DO's. Bill George =============================================================================== ... Any sufficiently advanced bug will become a feature. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4975 Date: 09-12-93 20:32 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #9 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 11) FOR %%V IN /SOMETHING ... quoting Dirk Treusch to All ... 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 drive!). Mitch Ames responds: The variable %0 contains the name of the batch file _as_it_was_typed_at_the_command_line. If you call 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, use STRINGS, or similar (I don't have a copy, so don't ask me to post it). Alternatively use the undocumented FOR %%V in /SOMETHING command, eg: 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: Disclaimer - I haven't tested this. Debugging is up to you. (You can, of course, fit this into a single recursive batch file - but that's left as an exercise for the student.) 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 5 - I don't know about other versions. Mitch Ames =============================================================================== 12) LEADING SLASH WITH FOR IN DO LOOP In the FOR statement in the INIT and COUNT routines below the parameters in the () show a leading "/". This seems to separate the first digit of the environmental variable used within the brackets (). Am I correct? Is this documented anywhere? :================= INIT ================= set &=%4&|set n$=%4|set m$=%3|set #=%2|set !=%0 if not '%m$%'=='0' for %%a in (/%m$%z) do if '%%a'=='0' set @=0 %!% :================= COUNT ================ if '%&%'=='&' goto PROCESS for %%a in (/%&%) do set &=%%a Peter Joynson I have read some articles about this in PC Computing & PC Magazine. I don't believe it is documented anywhere but you're right, it strips off the first character of whatever string is passed. I will try to find one of the articles that explains it better if you need it. Robert Hupf Correct. I believe it is not documented (up to DOS 5 anyway) by MS, but I have read from other sources that the leading / will split an item into the first character and everything else. Eg: for %%n in (/hello there) do echo %%n will display "h", "ello" and "there". "There" is not split because it is a separate item, delimited by the space. If used with an item including wildcard (? or *) characters the item will not be expanded to the files which match it, thus allowing inclusion of those characters in the set. Eg: for %%n in (/? /*.bat hello) do echo %%n will display "?", "*", ".bat", "hello". This apparently is the original reason for the feature, but it may also be used recursively to parse a string one character at a time. Mitch Ames =============================================================================== ... Features should be discovered, not documented. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4976 Date: 09-12-93 20:34 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #10 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 13) ATTRIB ATTRIB +h dirname Is there anyway to create a hidden directory on a hard drive? I've since learned that DOS 5.0 ATTRIB can do the same thing from the command line: ATTRIB +h dirname. Gary Smith ATTRIB , attrib ,|echo y|del *.* It is not really piping the output of attrib to echo. Using the pipe is one way of stacking multiple commands on one line. All the "attrib ," does is reset _ALL_ attributes on _ALL_ files in the current directory. So if you were to run that from the root of your c: drive you would no longer have a bootable drive. Jim Banghart Worked fine here, took out all the files (system, hidden, read-only), like a dream with no lock up, using MSDos 5.0 Terry Kreft I do not recommend this practice. It does attempt to pipe the output of attrib to echo, and thus writes a file to the directory specified by the environment variable TEMP. If you try to run this program in your TEMP directory, you will get a sharing violation. It also actually slows your program, because it has to write and delete a useless file (unless you have your TEMP on a ramdisk). I can't say I see much reason for stacking commands like this -- put the commands on separate lines. A character is a character, be it a carriage return or a pipe, and your files will be easier to understand. Bruce Bowman =============================================================================== 14) INSTALLHIGH I think I may have found an undocumented feature for DOS 6.... I wasn't able to find this anywhere in the online help. It's called INSTALLHIGH= and amazingly enough it works just like INSTALL= but loads the file high! The only drawback to this is: Memmaker will not go through and add switches for that particular line during the "optimizing process". It just takes it as it is currently. But then again INSTALL= is ignored too! Example: DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS DEVICE=C:\DOS\EMM386.EXE NOEMS HIGHSCAN WIN=F500-F7FF WIN=F200-F4FF dos=HIGH dos=UMB installhigh=c:\dos\share.exe Robin Francis MUF reported in the magazine C'T: You can use the DOS 6.0 command "installhigh" in config.sys to load TSR programs into UMA. A 48 byte environment will be added for every program. If you use it you don't need the "loadhigh" in autoexec.bat any more. But Memmaker can't handle installhigh! Thomas Erbe Further to Robins explanation, INSTALLHIGH cannot be directed to a specific UMB area and thus defaults to largest currently available. Like INSTALL it is processed (about) last of C.SYS lines and causes more consumed RAM overhead than calling TSR from A.BAT or later. Richard Pade There is an undocumented CONFIG.SYS command called INSTALLHIGH. It is similar to INSTALL except that it will load the TSR into an UMB. It is available under DOS 6. However, it does not support the /L and /S switches that DEVICEHIGH and LOADHIGH support. Tom Dyas Then it is useless, isn't it? It has less than the capabilities of LOADHIGH and DEVICEHIGH but load the same TSRs that they load ... no wonder it is an undocumented command. Wayne Moses Just wondering, does INSTALLHIGH work with Microsoft DOS 5? It would also be nice to know why it is undocumented. It doesn't do anything major! Microsoft gains nothing by keeping it undocumented. Loading TSR's from CONFIG.SYS is better because an environment is not allocated for the TSR. A very small amount of memory is conserved, but it is still conserved. Tom Dyas =============================================================================== ... DOS 6.0 - DOS 4.01 with its features documented. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4977 Date: 09-12-93 20:35 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #11 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 15) : (command) DOS uses a leading : to indicate a label. If the next character following the : is a space or other non-alphanumeric char, DOS will decide it's an invalid label and skip to the next line, performing no further action. Dennis Mccunney =============================================================================== 16) PATH With MS-Dos 6.0 you CAN exceed the normal path length limit by putting a "Set Path=C:\;..." in your Config.Sys file instead of your AutoExec.Bat file. The usual limits do not apply there. I have put in a path well over 800 characters and it works fine. The path doesn't display correctly via PATH or SET, but it's in there and it all gets searched. I don't recommend having a path that long, mine is normally only 6-8 directories. Andrew Barnhardt =============================================================================== 17) EDLIN where an EDLIN script is: -1,#r 1:^Z 1: -1,#r 2:^Z 2: -1,#r 3:^Z 3: -1,#r 4:^Z 4: -1,#r 5:^Z 5: -1,#r 6:^Z 6: -1,#r 7:^Z 7: -1,#r 8:^Z 8: -1,#r 9:^Z 9: e Note the spaces (one after R, two after ^Z) which prevent replacement of the second digit in a two digit number. This will update the last line only, so needs to be done at each boot. '#' means last line +1. '-1' means the line before the current one (ie: the last line of the file, if "#" is the current line). Note that you can only use '-1' in later versions (it works in 5, but not in 3.30 as far as I know). Mitch Ames =============================================================================== 18) DELIMITING CHARACTER: Prior to DOS 5.0, there was an undocumented DOS function that would allow you to set the DOS option delimiting character to something else, like -. Once you did this, you could use either \ *or* / in PATH specs. DOS 5.0 removed the function to *set* the option delimiter, but *retained* the one to query what it currently is! (Don't ask me, ask M'Soft...) Fortunately, the MKS Toolkit still works with no apparent glitches. I believe in pre-DOS 3.X versions that there was a parm you could provide in CONFIG.SYS to do this, but have no further details. Just remember: "undocumented" is a synonym for "unsupported, and not guaranteed to be there next release", which is what happened in the case I mentioned above. Dennis Mccunney =============================================================================== 19) REM IN LINES WITH PIPES OR REDIRECTS ie: REM echo y | del *.* Michael Serber reported that he encountered problems when he tried to REM out an "echo y|del *.*" line in his batch file. Here is the content of some of the responses he received in response to his question asking why he experienced the problem: It (the problem) appears to only occur if there is a pipe or redirection in the line (REM'd out), leading me to believe that DOS first handles pipes and redirections, then goes back to find out what to do with them. John Mudge It's actually doing what it thinks you've told it: piping the output of REM to DEL. Since REM _has_ no output (remember REM > NULLFILE?), DEL hangs, waiting for the answer to its question. Gary Smith What is happening here is that DOS reads the entire line, and always processes redirection and piping *first*, regardless of where they happen to appear. Dennis Mccunney =============================================================================== ... That's not a bug! It's a seldom-used, undocumented feature! ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4978 Date: 09-12-93 20:38 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #12 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 20) CALL The DOS 5.0 manual, in the command reference for CALL, states: Syntax: call [drive:][path]filename [batch-parameters] Parameters [drive:][path]filename Specifies the name and location of the batch program you want to call. Filename must have a .BAT extension. The latter sentence is not true in DOS 5.0. CALL works equally well whether "filename" is a .BAT, .COM, or .EXE file, or even internal command the following all work just fine: call dir call mem call tree call echo Phhhhhhht! Gary Smith =============================================================================== 21) CHOICE I blundered onto an interesting choice.com feature: CHOICE /C:XM*; /N /T:2,5 if errorlevel=4 goto help if errorlevel=3 goto end ......etc The "*" is the escape key, and the ";" is F1 etc. Robert Lindsay =============================================================================== 22) MEM /A If you do a MEM /A it'll give you details of what's in the first meg of memory. Windoze owners get MSD.EXE (a pretty undocumented utility), that tells you this sort of thing. If you do a MEM /A it'll give you details of what's in the first meg of memory. Ben Davis =============================================================================== 23) MOUSE /U Microsoft mouse driver version 8.1 has a /U switch. Adding that switch loads all but 3.3k of the driver into HMA. It's not quite the most recent version mouse driver, but hey, a mouse driver is a mouse driver is a mouse driver, right? Especially when it only takes 3.3k of ram! Mark Carter Are you getting that result by loading the mouse driver high on a 286? If so, that is good news. Mine takes up 12k of main RAM (MS mouse driver ver. 7.0). Gerry Pareja Mouse 8.0 _is_ able to load itself into HMA (I think) on a 286 by using the undocumented /U switch. I read it in PC Magazine sometime back. Also, PC Mag said that the BUFFERS have to be set to a low value, e.g. 5. Ng Cheng Kiang =============================================================================== ... All On-Line readers, press the un-documented ALT-H combination now... ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4979 Date: 09-12-93 20:40 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #13 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 24) %0 Note that %0 is (almost) always defined as the name of the batch file itself (including drive\directory as typed at the command line). The only time %0 is not defined is in Autoexec.bat when run by Command.com at boot time (or command/p). Mitch Ames The %0 parameter is the name of the program. But wait, there's more. If you want to test for the name of the program you are in! What do your want to test for? One time you type "edit", another you type "EDIT", another "EDIT.BAT", another "C:EDIT.BAT", and another "C:\BELFRY\EDIT.BAT". How many combinations do you want to test for at the start of your batch file? You can map the file name to upper case and take care of some of the problem as follows: SET SAVEPATH=%PATH% PATH %0 SET PROGNAME=%PATH% PATH %SAVEPATH% SET SAVEPATH= To do the test, something like this might work: FOR %%E IN (EDIT EDIT.BAT C:EDIT C:EDIT.BAT C:\BELFRY\EDIT ... ... C:\BELFRY\EDIT.BAT) DO IF '%%E'=='%PROGNAME%' GOTO HIT ECHO BAD COMMAND OR FILE NAME GOTO ENDIT ... :HIT REM START EXECUTION HERE.... There is one last gotcha to %0. When AUTOEXEC.BAT is run by the bootup sequence, %0 has no value. This is important if you want to find out if you are in AUTOEXEC.BAT, and if you are in AUTOEXEC.BAT for the first time. I have seen this work with IBM's PC-DOS 3.10, various flavors of MS-DOS 3.10, 3.30, 3.31, 4.01, and 5.00. It also seems to work with DR-DOS 6.0. As to 4DOS, I have no idea, but would welcome feedback on the matter (although 4DOS and DR-DOS hardly qualify for a MUF entry....) Mike Avery So far as I know, it's not been documented anywhere 'officially', but I did read about it in an article sometime back, probably either in PC Magazine or in PC Computing. Gary Smith I've never seen it documented - it just bit me one day REAL HARD! Well, the way I figured it was that when the boot process hands control to AUTOEXEC.BAT, the normal command line interface isn't used, so %0 never gets set. Mike Avery This feature can actually be useful, because you can put statements like this in your autoexec: if NOT (%0) == () goto skip [statements that should not be re-executed go here] :skip [statements that can be re-executed go here] path ... set ... etc. Then you can recreate your bootup environment at any time by simply typing AUTOEXEC. Gary Smith =============================================================================== ... Bill Gates and his search for undocumented Windows 3.1 code... ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4980 Date: 09-12-93 20:44 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #14 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 25) , . ... DIR, Using a comma IMMEDIATELY after DIR, shows ALL files, including the HIDDEN ones. EXAMPLE: DIR, Willem van den Broek This appears only to work with version 5. I tried it with 3.30, and it didn't display either IO.SYS, MSDOS.SYS (both with S, H and R attribs) or a test file with A and H attribs. With version 5 it displayed the test file with H and A, but would not display IO.SYS or MSDOS.SYS with S, H and R. This doesn't surprise me actually, since S alone (without H) will prevent inclusion of a file in a normal DIR. I didn't try version 4. Mitch Ames Interesting: it does for me (display DOS5 IO.SYS and MSDOS.SYS): However, 4DOS does not do it: Dennis Mccunney It was pointed out in the 4DOS echo, and there were people who said it didn't work for them. But, on my machine running straight dos6, it works! DIR, (dir comma) in my C:\ shows all files including hidden and system. Bill George DIR.. With DOS 6.0 you can get a directory of -all- files (hidden, system, etc.) with this command. It was in a PC/Mag. or PC/Comp. issue not too long ago. Andrew Barnhardt Have you noticed also how DIR... only displays directories, not files? Gary Marden That's pretty slick. I tried DIR.. and got the parent directory. DIR... got the current directory subdirs only. Bill George Works for any level of directories. ".." will go to the previous directory as with pure DOS, "..." will go to the directory before the previous and so on. Ng Cheng Kiang In DOS 5.0 it displays directories and files with no extensions. I tried "DIR ...", "DIR...", and "DIR ....". They all behave the same way. Gary Smith With DOS 5.0 and NDOS 6.0 DIR... gives me a list of subdirectories off of the root and a list of all files in the root directory, regardless of the file extension. It will yield this result regardless of what directory / subdirectory I am in at the time the command is issued. Gary Cooper COMMAND.COM generally seems to ignore excess characters. Try copying something the AIRPLANES.PLAN, for example, and see what happens. Gary Smith While I was playing around with "dir ..." and trying to see how it parses to showing all extensionless entities in the current directory, I noticed that DIR doesn't care if a specified directory structure exists or not, as long as the overall structure points back to something that does exist, i.e. "dir \thisdirdoesnotexist\.." will ignore the garbage and show the root directory. If c:\bat exists, then "dir c:\bat\thisdirdoesnotexist\nordoesthisone\..\.." will show the c:\bat directory. Again, absolutely useless as far as i can tell , but interesting. BTW, has anybody solved the "dir ..." mystery yet? I also noticed "dir \..." works while "dir \bat\..." fails (any explicitly specified directory other than the root generates an "invalid directory" message). Paul Leonard =============================================================================== ... WOMAN.ZIP....Great program, no documentation! ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4981 Date: 09-12-93 20:48 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #15 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 26) COPY. A: The use of a decimal point IMMEDIATELY after some DOS statements, will replace *.* 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, but I haven't tried them yet. Willem van den Broek "." means the current directory, and Command.com will assume that \directory implies \directory\*.* for most commands where a filename(s) should be specified, eg: DIR \ is the same as DIR \*.* COPY \FRED is the same as COPY \FRED\*.* COPY. A:\ is the same as COPY .\*.* A:\ which is the same as COPY *.* A:\ DEL. is the same as DEL .\*.* which is the same as DEL *.* Mitch Ames Have you noticed also how DIR ... only displays directories, not files? Gary Marden In DOS 5.0 it displays directories and files with no extensions. I tried "DIR ...", "DIR...", and "DIR ....". They all behave the same way. Gary Smith Another good thing is you can travel from directories to directories without typing "CD". Just type the directory name followed by a backslash '\'. Example: To go from C:\BATCH to C:\WP51, you type "\wp51\". That's it! fast and easy. Marc Y. Paulin If you are in the following directory : \WORD\FILES\LETTERS\APRIL And wanted to go to the directory \WORD\FILES, you'd normally type two lines : CD \ CD WORD\FILES Or even the single line "CD \WORD\FILES" to combine the two commands into one. There is a shorter way, simply type the following : CD ..\.. You're there ! Andrew Barnhardt In DOS 5.0, it displays files and directories which have no extension. Larry Kessler On this machine with DOS 5.0 and NDOS 6.0 DIR... gives me a list of subdirectories off of the root and a list of all files in the root directory, regardless of the file extension. It will yield this result regardless of what directory/subdirectory I am in at the time the command is issued. Gary Cooper Editor's Note: I admit that "features" in the last two MUFs may be documented (although obscure feature), the reason that it continues to be seen in the MUF list is because I believe that the ability to use the period immediately IE: 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 "*.*" =============================================================================== ... Documentation - The worst part of programming. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4982 Date: 09-12-93 20:49 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #16 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ 27) MULTIPLE DOS COMMANDS ON ONE LINE set &=%4&|set n$=%4|set m$=%3|set #=%2|set !=%0 /|\ /|\ /|\ /|\ |_________|_________|________|_________________________Separators The separators (|) used in the line, are these doing anything other than separating commands? Can this be used for entering multiple commands on any line in a batch file regardless of type of command? Peter Joynson I believe you are right about this, but I think it pipes any output from the previous command to the next one (your example doesn't have any output. For example: ECHO Y|ERASE *.* This would pipe the Y to the command ERASE *.* so you wouldn't have to enter the Y for the "Are you sure" prompt. Robert Hupf The | is a pipe symbol, well documented in your DOS manual. (Read it before you read the rest of this message if you don't know about pipes already, otherwise the rest won't make sense.) Pipes can be used to put multiple commands on a single line, provided that the first command does not write anything to StdOout which might cause a problem when read by the second command as StdIn. Also, it is assumed that you don't want to see the output of any but the last command, since each command's output will be piped to the next's input. Note that in this case SET neither writes anything to StdOut nor reads StdIn. Thirdly, you must have write access to the current drive, or %temp% if defined, since a pipe always creates a temporary file. Eg this would not work if run from a write protected floppy (unless %temp% was defined), since DOS would fail to create the temporary files. Pipes create temporary files even if no actual data is sent to StdOut because Command effectively treats this: prog1 | prog2 as something like this: prog1 > %temp%tempfile prog2 < %temp%tempfile del %temp%tempfile Even if prog1 doesn't create any output, at least one zero length file is created. To demonstrate, try this set temp= set | dir I must say this beats the usual boring old "how do I echo a blank line in a batch file" etc. Mitch Ames =============================================================================== 28) COM or EXE Also, have you noticed that 4DOS.COM (when viewed with LIST) begins with the letters "MZ"? Isn't that the mark of a .EXE file? Very interesting... Thomas Smith It sure is, and that's an example of something else that may be a MUF. DOS doesn't care whether the extension on an executable file is .COM or .EXE. It looks at the beginning of the file and does the right thing according to what it finds. Gary Smith =============================================================================== ... Real users don't read documentation. ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6) Ä Area: [ECHO] BATCH POWER PROG. ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Msg#: 4983 Date: 09-12-93 20:51 From: Gary Cooper Read: Yes Replied: No To: ALL Mark: Subj: MUF Ver. 1.6 #17 ÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄÄ Editor's Note: Technically the following information is NOT a MUF, but is included here due to the fact that it may help save someone a lot of grief! Similar to advising others not to use delayed cache writes and DOS 6.0's DoubleSpace. 29) CHKDSK Can you tell me the _date_ of the BAD CHKDSK? I live in fear of it as I mainly work on other peoples computers an I have no way of telling if I will destroy their HD with a simple chkdsk command! Wallace Mcgee The only problem with CHKDSK is with large partitions where DOS uses a 256-sector FAT. Specifically with partition sizes in the ranges of: 127MB-129MB 254MB-258MB 508MB-516MB 1018MB-1030MB 2035MB-2061MB The date of the CHKDSK that has that problem is 04/09/91. The replacement being dated 11/11/91. UNDELETE has the same problem for the same reason. Bottom line is - if you don't have partitions in these size ranges - you don't have a problem. The corrected versions can be had by downloading from the MS BBS. Probably also available off of CompuServ. The file to look for is: PD0464.EXE. The phone number for the MS BBS is (206) 936-6735. Hope that helps you and others with the same question. Steve Osterday =============================================================================== 30) DELTREE Another new, and potentially dangerous, feature of IBM DOS v6.01. If you were on drive C: and issued the command: DELTREE /Y \ it would dutifully, and without stopping to ask for verification, delete your entire drive C:! (You can test it on a floppy with directories, subdirectories, and files scattered throughout ... just make sure you specify and/or are on that drive (disk) when issuing the above command). Vernon Frazee =============================================================================== Well folks, that's it for Vol.1 #6 Please forward any information about other Fabulous MUFs to Gary Cooper in the FidoNet BatPower echo or at the addresses below. Gary Cooper, Co-Sysop Programmer's Corner FidoNet 1:255/6.0 gary.cooper.@f6.n255.z1.fidonet.org Thanks! Till next time, we return you to your regularly scheduled BatPower program . . . ... Damn the documentation, full speed ahead! ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 -!- EzyQwk V1.02 ! Origin: Programmer's Corner BBS, Saint John, NB (v32/v42) (1:255/6)