Re: Further to XY under XP: finding config.xy

["Patricia M. Godfrey" priscamg@xxxxxxxx]

First, I apologize for mucking up the threading, but I had to get
my mail at the office yesterday, and Tbird will NOT let you copy
a post from one PC to another and let it go into your inbox or
any other folder. Isn't there ANY email app that will just deal
in plain text files, and let the enduser decide were he or she
wants to store them, and copy and paste between?
Anyway, thanks to Robert, both for information and for
forbearance (no allusions to Ursus holmgreni intended); I quite
expected to be flamed to a crisp. I am not quite as stupid as I
must look; only terribly ignorant of the workings of XP.

≫The "Working Dir" is where the executable, EDITOR.EXE, is
≫located.≪
Well, apparently I'll have to accept that as BBBG's definition;
it isn't mine. But changing that appears to be the ONLY way,
except for calling Xy with a batch file, which BBBG dosn't like
either, to get logged on to the drive where editor.exe's
directory is.
First to clarify directory structure: on the W2K and both XP
boxes, editor.exe resides in a directory/folder named xy4 on a
separate logical drive (d: here and on the W2K box, f: on the
office XP box). All the other xy files (startup.int,
settings.dfl, *.pm, U2, etc.) are in that directory or
subdirectories of it (e.g., filters, btfonts).

≫ Where are KBD/DFL/DLG/U2/etc? Whereever
≫ they are, use STARTUP.INT to get you there!
They too are in d:\ [or f:\]Xy4. But so is startup.int. And
unless I am logged on to d:\xy4, Xy cannot find startup.int. And
since a shortcut is by default on c:\Documents and
Settings\Moi\Desktop, that's where editor.exe starts up (that's
what the titlebar of the VDM says).
Now I did some experiments at the office, on the XP Pro box. I
created autoxy.nt, in %systemroot%\system32\, consisting of the
following commands:
@echo off

REM Install DPMI support
lh %SystemRoot%\system32\dosx

CD F:\XY4
F:
I got the first two by copying from autoexec.nt. I used separate
cd and F: commands, because CD /D is only supported by cmd.exe,
and this was running under the command.com vdm.
I then specified this file as the one to be used (in the advanced
properties tab of the pif). The f: command didn't take. When I
double clicked, Xy came up running in c:\windows\documents and
settings\moi\desktop, and couldn't find startup.int. But if I
typed dir f:, I got a listing of f:\xy4. So the CD part took, but
not the log in.

I then created a batch file (runxyxp.bat) consisting of the commands
CD F:\XY4
F:
and specified that to run as the "Batch file" in the pif.
properties page. Same thing happened.

I then created a shortcut to that batch file, added a line reading
editor.exe,
and double clicked on it. Xy came up running in f:\xy4, with
everything normal and handsome about it. But we're not supposed
to do this! (And I THINK, but I'd have to check, and that
involves rebooting here, that one then doesn't have the memory
tab and a few others on the pif properties page.)

≫have you right-clicked on an empty portion of the
≫Taskbar (by default, at the bottom of the Desktop), click
≫"Toolbars", then checkmark "Desktop" and "Quick Launch". Have
≫you dragged apps down to the Quick Launch pad (by default, left
≫side of the Taskbar).
I find it easier to find things on my desktop. Except for the
newest office XP box, I'm working on ancient and fairly small
monitors, so there isn't much room on the toolbar. But what I
have been doing of late is creating a folder (in C:\documents and
settings\All users on the XP boxes, anywhere in c: on the 9x
ones), creating shortcuts to all drives (three or four logical, a
CD, a floppy, one or two flash drives, and a half-dozen camera
media cards on the two XP boxes at the office), plus mapped
network drives, and putting that on the toolbar. That way, one
can easily reach any drive one wants without wading through My
Computer.

≫ Windows encourages you to create different Users
≫ with different persona, to Log In/Log Out, and to make sure
≫ nobody has Administrator privileges -- this way each user
≫ has her own Desktop and configuration, and no user can
≫ completely wreck the machine
We're trying to get people used to this at the office. For years,
we just had one user name and password per machine. Under 9x,
where permissions are a bad joke, there wasn't much else you
could do. But I do have myself as a separate persona on the XP
boxes, so I can access drives on other machines that only I use
to back them up. The problem is that if a user has permissions,
so does any malware that might sneak in while he or she is using
the system. And it's not just the maladroitness of our users
(actually, the editor is pretty savy, and the office manager is
too timid to do much harm), it's the sources we get some files
from. I could tell you horror stories, but I've gone on too long.
Short form: How do you write commands that XP will read from a
file? Because sooner or later I'm going to be setting diferent
paths for different NTVDMs.
By the bye, does Copy Con not work under XP? I tried it today,
when I was creating .nt and .bat files, but was rattled and may
have forgotten something. Typed
copy con runxyxp.bat
f:
cd f:\xy4
editor.exe
and then hit CtrlZ. Nothing seemed to happen, but I may have
forgotten to hit enter.

--
Patricia M. Godfrey
PriscaMG@xxxxxxxx