 The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group Members' Tips 'n' Tricks Ron Taylor |
Questions about computer related tasks will invariably lead to a seeming multitude of answers, most of which are usually right.
It is very easy to get confused at times as to which path to take in order to achieve a given objective. Or is it? As in most aspects of life the best solution is usually the one that works for you, and how do you find that out?-by experimenting with different alternatives! Many of the tips we offer here are just that, a starting point for you to unleash your creativity and make that PC work the way you want it to, the best way.
Last month, almost all of our tips were Windows related, this time we even the balance with a variety for MS-DOS users. Martin Scerri has came up with a little beauty on Ramdisks, Alistair is back with his batch file specials and also a big welcome again to Peter Young, one of our resident experts on e-mail. Enjoy!
Personal Quick File Locater
by Alistair Lloyd
Here's a quick MS-DOS batch that was whipped up out of curiosity more than anything. There are several "file finder" programs on the market, some of which are very fast and have a number of snazzy features. This is not one of them. QFIND is designed to do a rapid, no-frills search on a filename (or wildcarded filename). It allows you the option of searching down through the current directory and sub-directories, or from the root directory, (i.e. everywhere on the disk). For example
C:\WINDOWS> QFIND *.BAK
Will search for any files with a BAK extension, through the WINDOWS path, and any subdirs hanging off it.
C:\COMMS> QFIND LL*.* +
Will search the root directory and all sub-directories for files starting with "LL". As with most DOS commands, the result can be directed directly to a file or a printer. e.g.
QFIND *.COM > C:\TEMPFILE.TXT
or
QFIND *.COM >
rem QFIND.BAT
rem by Alistair
@ECHO=OFF
IF %1. ==. GOTO NULL
IF %2. ==. GOTO NORMAL
IF %2 == "+" GOTO 2NULL
ECHO.
ECHO Extra fields ignored...
ECHO.
:NORMAL
REM Section 1
REM All from current dir.
ECHO.
DIR %1 /S /B /P
ECHO.
GOTO ENDIT
:2NULL
REM Section 2 -
REM All from CURRENT DIR.
CD \
ECHO List of all files from
ECHO root dir:
ECHO.
DIR %1 /S /B /P
ECHO.
GOTO ENDIT
:NULL
REM Section 3 -
REM No parameters entered!
ECHO.
ECHO QFIND [filename] [+]
ECHO.
ECHO This command searches
ECHO down through sub
ECHO directories for the
ECHO the file(s) specified
ECHO as the first parameter.
ECHO Wildcards OK. Use "+"
ECHO as the second parameter
ECHO to search from root
ECHO directory.
ECHO.
:ENDIT
ECHO.
Send Netmail with Bluewave
by Peter Young
It is quite easy to send netmail to another person using the Bluewave Offline Mail Reader, just do one of the following
If you are wanting to reply via netmail to a message you are reading, just press Alt+N. This will take the address from the Origin Line and automatically insert it in the reply. Once you upload that packet you have sent netmail!
If you want to send Netmail to another person by entering a new message (not replying to something) then select "Enter Message in any Area" from the menu, or while reading messages press Alt+E and select the netmail area. You will need to know the netmail address of the person you wish to send netmail to.
The address is in the form of 3:632/309.0
where
3 is the Zone (e.g. zone 1 = USA; zone 2 = Europe);
632 is the Net (Area group of BBSs);
309 is the node (or BBS);
.0 is a point off the BBS.
If you have regular netmail contact with certain people, you can record their netmail address in the NAMES.BW file. Then when posting a netmail message, entering a "?" in the from field will bring
up a screen of your names and allow you to select from them.
Extract of NAMES.BW file
; The Blue Wave Offline Mail Reader v2.12
; Copyright (C) 1992 by Cutting Edge Computing
; All Rights Reserved.
;
;NAMES.BW Lookup File
gh,George Hatchew,1:2240/176
;End of NAMES.BW
Most netmail, (especially from BBS Users) is sent routed, which means it leaves with the normal echomail and is sent via many other BBSs during their normal mail runs before arriving at its destination.
From past experience, I have found it quite reliable in reaching its destination within Australia, but very unreliable in reaching its destination overseas. This is judging from the replies I have received from netmail sent to an overseas address.
Associating Files And Programs
by Alistair Lloyd
See that little chest of drawers sitting in the corner of your Main Window? Yes, the yellow one. That's the File Manager. Probably one of the more useful tools that come built in to Windows 3.1. The File Manager gives you visual access to a wide range of file and directory utilities. One
feature that does not get enough airplay these days is the Associate Files function.
There are certain types of file in this world whose lot in life is relatively stable. These include .TXT files, or .DOC files created by our favourite Word Processors, and the like. Windows, using the File Manager, can be set up to recognise this fact, and launch into the desired application by selecting the file, rather than the program.
For example: fm a big fan of dBASE III+. It comes with its own programming language, and you can write programs that are saved with a .PRG extension. If you wanted to set up Windows to start dBASE each time you selected a .PRG file, you would do the following:
If you hit the Browse button, Windows will present a list of available programs, PIFs and the like, that could be used to open files. In this case, select the dBASE directory, and the DBASE.EXE file. (I have it set up as a DBASE.PIF, so that Windows uses it more efficiently).
The next time you double-click on a .PRG file in the File Manager, Windows will consult its Association list, and launch into dBASE, automatically running the program.
To remove an association, open up the Associate box, enter in the extension, but choose [None] from the list box that the dialogue box gives you. Click on OIK, and the work is done.
Some good ones to try are:
.TXT
files Associate with your preferred text
editor.
.QWK
files Associate with an Offline Mail reader
.WK1
files Associate with Lotus, etc.
Quick Archive Viewing
by Alistair Lloyd
What is in that mysterious archive package, I hear you cry! It is common to CLS download files from Bulletin Boards, or receive software packages that have been compressed in some way. These can often lurk mysteriously on one's hard disk,
contents unknown. Two of the more common archivers in use today are LHA and PKZIP.
If you frequently query the contents of these files, it can get a bit tiring finding the correct syntax to use for either archive. To speed things up, I wrote two batch files, called ZIPVIEWBAT, and LHAVIEWBAT as shown in the listings. I keep these files in a directories dedicated to batch files, which is included in my path. This way, I can call them from any directory.
rem ZIPVIEW.BAT
rem by Alistair Lloyd
@ECHO=OFF
CLS
IF %1.==. GOTO NOFILE
PKUNZIP -V %1 | MORE
GOTO ENDIT
:NOFILE
ECHO You did not specify
ECHO a file name to view!
:ENDIT
PAUSE
EXIT
rem LHAVIEW.BAT
rem by Alistair Lloyd
@ECHO=OFF
CLS
IF %1 .==. GOTO NOFILE
LHA L %1 | MORE
GOTO ENDIT
: NOFILE
ECHO You did not specify
ECHO a file name to view!
:ENDIT
PAUSE
EXIT
To run these programs from DOS, make sure that either the LHA or PKUNZIP programs are in your path. (Type PATH at the DOS prompt to display the directories available. The programs must be in one of these directories.) Then, run either ZIPVIEW [filename] or LHAVIEW [filename], and the contents of the file will be displayed screen by screen.
Alternatively, you can run them from Windows. Set up a .PIF file (Refer Chapter 8 of your Windows manual), and put a question mark "?" in the Optional Parameters box. When you double-click the icon that calls your PIF, Windows will pop up an input box, asking for the filename. Enter in the full directory and filename, and away you go!
tRAP THAT cAPS IOCK kEY
by Ron Taylor
Oops! there it goes again. I didn't notice that the CapsLock key was on and went on typing the above line as I had intended it to come out in mixed case. Turned out mixed all right, didn't it! Well, thankfully computers are programmable, so lets make
them solve the problem so that it won't happen again.
This little TSR program will stop it, sensing whether CapsLock is on - if so, all shifted characters will come out as we humans expect them to, in UPPER case! Fire up your
favourite Editor and type in the script from the listing, check it first and save it as a ASCII file named TRAPCAPS.DBG. Then from the DOS prompt just enter
DEBUG < TRAPCAPS.DBG
In no time the DOS prompt will reappear. The DIR command reveals that you have created a new program file TRAPCAPS.COM (86 bytes). Load it from the command line, from AUTOEXEC.BAT, or even put it in the Upper Memory Blocks (UMBs) if you prefer, by using the LH prefix.
|
Ntrapcaps.com A100 JMP 13C NOP NOP NOP NOP STI PUSH AX MOV AH,2 INT 16 TEST AL,3 JZ 114 TEST AL,40 . JNZ 11A POP AX CS: JMP FAR [102] PUSH DS MOV AX,40 MOV DS,AX AND BYTE PTR [17],BF POP DS POP AX IRET MOV AX,3509 INT 21 MOV [102],BX MOV [104],ES MOV AX,2509 MOV DX,106 INT 21 MOV DX,13C INT 27 RCX |
CD-ROMs and Dynamic Ramdisks
by Martin Scerri
I wanted to install a RAMDISK. In this case SRDISK, a ramdisk which gives the added benefit of being resizable "on.the fly". I had a CD-ROM installed as drive E:, and several software packages installed to access it as such, therefore a change in drive letter was
very undesirable.
The CD-ROM drivers install in two parts-the device driver SBCD.SYS in CONFIG.SYS and the MS-DOS extensions MSCDEX.EXE, in AUTOEXEC.BAT. No matter what I did, because the ramdisk loads in CONFIG.SYS, and the CD-ROM doesn't appear to attach itself to a drive letter until MSCDEX in AUTOEXEC.BAT, the ramdisk would grab E: and leave the CD-ROM at F:. "Telling" the ramdrive what letter to use did not help, nor did using a dummy driver to reserve E:.
Solution: Rather than load the ramdrive driver in CONFIG.SYS, use DRVLOAD, a shareware program that loads device drivers from AUTOEXEC.BAT rather than CONFIG.SYS. Now the CD-ROM gets in first, and ramdrive gets loaded
after MSCDEX.EXE. I have uploaded both of these excellent programs to our BBS, look for SRDISK13.LZH
and DRVLOAD.LZH.
Of course, the "normal" ramdrive program that comes with MS-DOS, RAMDRIVE.SYS, can be allocated in preferred
order by putting it before or after the CD-ROM device in CONFIG.SYS. However you cannot change the size of the MS ramdisk without completely rebooting the PC. SRDISK also has many added features and takes less memory.
Reprinted from the June 1994 issue of PC Update, the magazine of Melbourne PC User Group, Australia
