Re: New program: Request for testers

["Robert Holmgren" holmgren@xxxxxxxx]

** Reply to message from "M.C."  on Mon, 16 Feb 2004 23:18:41
+0100


> Why not? Please detail a bit more the question of the 307 Kb file. I
> suppose it's a stand-alone program. Am I right? Any performance penalty
> in our XyWrite tasks?

Zero. It just sits on your disk, waiting to be called. Standalone. If you
want to get a jump on things, download it now and install it:

http://users.datarealm.com/xywwweb/WIN95CMD.ZIP

There is one file inside the zip: KMD.EXE. I renamed it KMD.EXE so that
nobody running NT would accidentally overwrite their real CMD.EXE. This
(Win2000-based) command processor works on all Win32 operating systems, from 95
OSR2 (at least) to XP, and it yields exactly the consistent, standard results
that make programming easy (and otherwise a nightmare in Windows, because the
operating systems are all so different). The consistent response opens up a
world of possibilities that we may exploit in many ways in future. It is
PERFECT for our purposes.

I'm going to insist that everybody who uses these LFN programs install this
file on their machine. It does NOTHING to your machine's configuration or
operation. Completely harmless -- just another program lying around.

Place it at the *very beginning* of your DOS PATH (for speed). Go to a DOS
prompt and command "echo %PATH%", then look at the resulting PATH spec.
Usually it will say something like "C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND;D:\XY4;" --
or anyway, it should (and certainly should include your XyWrite directory).
Put KMD.EXE in the _first_ directory named (they are always separated by
semicolons), e.g. (per the example above) in C:\WINDOWS.

I had one of those "how dumb can you be" moments yesterday. I really thought
that I was "9x clean", having upgraded all my Windows machines to NT. Then,
yesterday, playing with an old desktop sitting here (which auto-boots into
OS/2), I took more than usual note of a "WIN" entry displayed in OS/2 Boot
Manager, which I had seen a thousand times and always assumed was Windows v3.1.
So, after ignoring it for years, yesterday I tried it. Lo and behold, up comes
a secondary menu offering two different flavors of Windows: NT4 SP6 (which I
also removed from all other machines about a year ago), and another ambiguous
"Windows" entry. Ah, I thought, that must be Win3.1. But I tried that one,
and whoa! a copy of Win95 OSR2 that I had apparently never even opened or used
(it asked my name, my time zone, etc). I was beginning to regret that I had
trashed all these (truly lousy) operating systems on my other computers,
because I could no longer test what users were saying about 9x. Anyway, I
configured both of these installations (hadn't touched the NT install in about
five years, which is why I forgot about it), and was able to test these LFN
programs. They work perfectly in both of these environments. One tester was
having spotty results with NT4 (the oldest of all the Win32 operating systems,
unless you consider NT v3.5, which I think is now a fossil); but, for me, all
the LFN stuff worked splendidly.

So now I'm thinking that I'll keep this old machine around, and load it up with
other truly lousy operating systems, such as Win98SE -- for testing purposes.
I tried to install my son's version of Win98SE for his Dell, I got ALL the way
through the installation, and after half an hour of grinding away -- it was
really completely installed! -- up pops a message that the CD can only be used
with a Dell computer. Bloody bleeping sadists, these people! And then it
grinds for another 5 minutes, erasing everything... So I need to get my hands
(briefly) on an OEM version of W98SE... and/or WinME...

-----------------------------
Robert Holmgren
holmgren@xxxxxxxx
-----------------------------