os2fan2

I suppose you could always mod it to look like Windows 3.0, i guess.

You can't really get around to changing the settings until the settings are created. I do not know where these come from, but this is a rexx script to do the throbber. The byte that it changes also controls other settings in the UI. This is a regina rexx script, using Patric McPhee's w32util.dll at http://home.interlog.com/~ptjm/software.html /* Shell throbber/dethrobber. The core now works. */numeric digits 50 regroot = 'HKEY_CURRENT_USER'regbase = 'Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Toolbar\'regword = 'ITBarLayout' call rxfuncadd 'w32loadfuncs', 'w32util', 'w32loadfuncs'call w32LoadFuncsparse arg a1 a2if pos(a1,'012') = 0 then dosay "THROB.REX non-distructively alters the throbber in IE and the Shell"say ""say "the throbber is the little rotating thing in the top right hand corner"say "of the window"say "This is to be run under the target system, not in PE boot"; saysay "Usage: THROB shell ie"say " 0 turn off the throbber"say " 1 turn on the throbber"say " 2 just look."; say ""say "if the throbber is on, then the last hex digit is a letter or over 8"say "a value of 0 to 7 means it is off".endif pos(a1,'012') = 0 then a1 = 2if pos(a2,'012') = 0 then a2 = 2 /* Shell Browser */call regpeek 'ShellBrowser', a1call regpeek 'Explorer', a1/* IE */call regpeek 'WebBrowser', a2 exit regpeek:parse arg t0, t1reghere = w32regopenkey(regroot, regbase || t0)if reghere=0 then do; call w32regclosekey(reghere); return; end;k1 = w32regqueryvalue(reghere, regword)parse var k1 1 k1a 33 k1b 35 k1cselect when t1 = 1 then r1 = b2x( bitor(x2b(k1b), '00001000')) when t1 = 0 then r1 = b2x(bitand(x2b(k1b), '11110111')) when t1 = 2 then r1 = k1b otherwise; r1 = k1b; say 'invalid option' t1; endr0 = w32regqueryvaluetype( reghere, regword)r2 = k1a || r1 || k1cs1 = w32regsetvalue(reghere, regword, r0, r2)if s1=0 then s2 = 'Y'; else s2 = 'N'call w32regclosekey(reghere)say t1 left(t0,20) r0 k1b r1 s2return

Windows NT relies on a NTFS that was updated in sp6 to 3.0 level (ie that found in Windows 2000). Even so, it does not allow things like quotas, spanning disks. The NTFS 3.1 as found in Windows XP is faster than the 2k version, because the directory structure has been moved further back in the disk, so there is less head movement. XP also allows you to defrag NTFS disks as well (see zB Andrei Gracef's site: http://www.geocities.com/andreigaceff/DefragNT.html ). I am not exactly sure what 2003 brings over XP, of if NTFS is superior as a file-system over some of the alternatives, such as OS/2's JFS or some of the UNIX/Linux stuff (which have long been server-based). For the average user, the main attraction for the later windows is that they support more API than the earlier versions. Windows 2000 introduced a more powerful command prompt, but the 2k cmd.exe runs quite well under nt, an ascii-only version exists for free download (win95cmd.exe), and 4nt is quite a competant replacement for the limited feature set of cmd.exe. Regina Rexx completes the picture. In the main, one can generally match much of the speed with 2000Lite or NLite, as well. (i have been working fairly extensively on an NT4 sp6a disk, that simplifies installs). W

Windows ME requires MS-DOS 8.00, not MS-DOS 7,10. Therefore the 7.10 file is of no use. The file format is DOS COM files. It basically consists of the old ibmbio.com + ibmdos.com + a bitmap (order unknown). W

I use pc-dos 6.30 (home brew) on one box, and ms-dos 10.50 on the other box. Like all DOS versions 10.x, these stem from an OS/2 vers 1.x. So it's MS-OS/2 vers 1.50. As with all versions of ms-dos since vers 8, you can't slip into straight dos mode. it loads a windows gui, here MS-BOB 5.0. Currently installed is OS/2 vers 1.40 (WinNT), 1.50 (Win2k), 1.51 (WinXP), 1.52 (Win2k3), 1.60 (Vista), along with OS/2 2.45 (ecomstation). I have dos versions 5.50, 6.30, 7.10 and 20.45 installed. Maybe i'm amazed. W

"your father's" is a term for "last generation". Yes, win286 was around, but mainly used as a runtime. You can set win311 up as a runtime library. It is said that this is what it was written for: running sol.exe!

I suppose it's a long way from the way we used to do it, back in the days of Windows 3.x, but i have been working on a documentation for the Windows 3.xx slipstream / add stuff etc. It's DOS 6.3 + Windows for Wallies 3.11, but it's a lot easier (and documented to boot), to configure these for install: http://z3.invisionfree.com/Boot_Land/index.php?showtopic=79 Loads of stuff that no-one has ever discussed much here. I salute those who have taken to do things like HFSLIP, USP5, etc. It's a long way from your father's windoze. Wendy

Basking in the Burbs of Brisbie, one finds a wendy who is an "os/2 fan, too". While she wonders through the fourth dimension, the delicies of dos keep her on her toes. http://www.geocities.com/os2fam2/index.html is written by me in rexx, of all things. Well it only goes to show, they will be over soon they said, now they lost themselves instead. W

For those curious, i use http://www.freedownloadmanager.org/ proggie, v 1.9. You can start-stop things with it, and it does one after another. W

I use a free-download-manager. I have done a number of 250k downloads (usp5, usp5.1, autopatch2000, autopatchxp). In the main, it can run on a low prioity stop-start while you answer emails and message boards. I have a 80mb download running in the mo. W

The 98se upgrade sometimes ask for an install depending on what kind of DOS it is started from. If you use an unmodified msdos from 98se, it will see that the upgrade has been pre-checked, and will go ahead (as far as i know). Even if you do it in msbatch.inf mode, it asks up front. For this reason, i have a copy of win31 on the same cdrom, which means that i can point the install at that directory. win95 is a much slower in the compliance check.

Getting MSJava to install on Windows 2000 or later is pretty hard, but not impossible. I am not sure about slipstreaming it, but you can run it in OEM install. You need to make your own version if you want the latest version as a freely installing one. This is what i did. You need both builds 3809 and 3810 for this exercise. extract these exe-files to different directories. You then copy "javatrig.exe" from 3809, overwriting the one in 3810. The command to run is as follows: javatrig.exe /l /nowin2kcheck /exe_install /vercheck /wxret You can pack the whole lot using IEXPRESS (available in Windows), and you have a general purpose one-stop installer. For multiple batch install, set the thing up with no install, etc. This is JAVA3810.SED. Put it in any directory. Put this file in a working directory eg C:\SOURCE Create a subdirectory MSJAVA86, and put all of the files from build 3810, and then overwrite javatrig.exe from build 3809 Create a subdirectory REDIST for the output Run the command iexpress /n java3810.SED You then have msjava that installs on any box. It is wise to have also UBMSJVM.EXE around, so you can uninstall it if need be. [Version] Class=IEXPRESS SEDVersion=3 [Options] PackagePurpose=InstallApp ShowInstallProgramWindow=0 HideExtractAnimation=0 UseLongFileName=0 InsideCompressed=0 CAB_FixedSize=0 CAB_ResvCodeSigning=0 RebootMode=I InstallPrompt=%InstallPrompt% DisplayLicense=%DisplayLicense% FinishMessage=%FinishMessage% TargetName=%TargetName% FriendlyName=%FriendlyName% AppLaunched=%AppLaunched% PostInstallCmd=%PostInstallCmd% AdminQuietInstCmd=%AdminQuietInstCmd% UserQuietInstCmd=%UserQuietInstCmd% SourceFiles=SourceFiles [Strings] InstallPrompt= DisplayLicense= FinishMessage= TargetName=.\redist\msjava86.exe FriendlyName=MS-JAVA 3810 AppLaunched=javatrig.exe /l /nowin2kcheck /exe_install /vercheck /wxret PostInstallCmd=<None> AdminQuietInstCmd= UserQuietInstCmd= FILE0="xmldso.cab" FILE1="filler.inf" FILE2="java.inf" FILE3="javabase.cab" FILE4="javaie30.cab" FILE5="javatrig.exe" FILE6="javax86.cab" FILE7="msjava.cat" FILE8="OAInst.exe" FILE9="osp.cer" FILE10="osp.zip" FILE11="W95INF16.DLL" FILE12="W95INF32.DLL" FILE13="wfcclean.exe" FILE14="ADVPACK.DLL" [SourceFiles] SourceFiles0=.\msjava86\ [SourceFiles0] %FILE0%= %FILE1%= %FILE2%= %FILE3%= %FILE4%= %FILE5%= %FILE6%= %FILE7%= %FILE8%= %FILE9%= %FILE10%= %FILE11%= %FILE12%= %FILE13%= %FILE14%=

You can launch the installation from "msbatch.inf", in a silent no-reboot mode. After this, you can install other stuff, and then reboot the system. You need some fancy number of quotes in both the msbatch and ie-explorer. Another option is to put some sort of iesetup.txt or something in the ie folder, and then launch the setup normally. It will find the setup text and do all of this automatically without a reboot. W

I have installed Winnt + sp6a on very modern machines, both before and after later Windows NT versions. Even though the new ide driver can see drives over 8GB, the ntboot os has to be in the first 8 MB for it to work properly. I typically give it 1 G for the OS drive. W

Try http://oldfiles.org.uk/powerload/bootdisk.htm The OEM disks typically did require the OEM to install their own drivers, because at the release of Win9x, many computers were relying on their sound-card to get to the cd-rom. IDE stuff did not turn up to a bit later, and i don't recall Microsoft ever distributing a cdrom driver with Windows 9x. Also most of the Win9x disks in circulation were not bootable, because they were meant to start from an already running system or boot disk. W

I had win 3.1 (a hand-scratch build, built mostly from Win3.11, (not the "for wallies", with bits of WinOS/2, assorted fix-wares and free-wares, and bits of windows 3,0 and windows for warehouses) booting from the floppy disk and cdrom way back in the mid-nineties. You basically set your windows 3.1x up as a network install (setup /a) to any directory. From this, you can modify (to some extent), the files WIN.SRC and SYSTEM.SRC (which is where win.ini and system.ini live), to get eg a workable network install. The next step is to use subst to lay out the ram-drive and cdrom drive, and install windows into the ramdrive by "setup /n". This creates the necessary files for the windows. It's about 140 KB, if i recall correctly, but much of this is fixed EXE and COM files. Since WIN.COM and a few others live as a composite of several files, you can recreate this in ram, by copying the files needed from the cdrom. When you fiddle around with removal of all of the unnecessary stuff, you reduce the %windir% down to something that can live in a 14K rar file. To run windows, you simply unrar this file to the r:\win directory, build win.com, winver.exe etc from the cdrom, and fire up win.com. You have to have the s:\windoze directory (where the network install lives) in the DOS path, but this can live at the end. Even doing this by normal means makes windows 3.1 and DOS more responsive. W

i was wondering, as i begin the dial-up download of usp 5.1.2195, if it were possible to put the extras into a separate service pack. Such things are not unknown elsewhere. OS/2 delivers the drivers in a separate service stream to the base OS. The second service pack could be multi-platform thing, eg Win2k / xp / ???. W

The same trick works under Windows 9x. You have to do something subtler to get Windows NT (ie NT/2K/XP/23) to do it, but it works as directed. You can even do it on a user-by-user basis W

1. PLUSTAB was originally distributed with Windows 95 P!us pack, which was integrated into Windows 98. My recollections is that the thing simply provides the Effects tab. You may need to unregister it before removing, eg regsvr32 /u plustab.dll 4. Sun Java runs on windows 98, and is reccomended. You can run both versions of java at once.

You use a line like "shell=sol.exe" in system.ini [boot] section. You can even do this sort of stuff under something like Windows XP. The trick, is to use some kind of task manager that can launch proggies. For example, taskman.exe = progman.exe or whatever. I used to use some kind of windows command line to do this sort of stuff. W

If you are running win2k, findstr is not a standard element. You may have to down load the reskit tool for it.

Nu2menu does an excellent job here. You can always refer to things relative to the root directory. These are initially relative to the start object. Links present a different problem, because the icon is hard coded in the pif file, along with the resolution. W

In the days of Windows 2.x, the standard way of running windows was 'single application mode', where the app in question was loaded as the shell, and windows was loaded as a DOS run-time loader. This is also how kiosk-mode programs typcially run. I have loaded things like spider.exe as the shell, as well as things like tcmd.exe. From what i recall, you can't really load command-line stuff as shell, although i used windows stuff like win95cmd, 4nt. tcmd32 works as a shell, though. I did make a version of Windows that fitted on a floppy disk, and launched sol.exe. Pretty useful: now what was windows really used for... W

There is at the 98lite site a version of the 95 explorer, that has its own attached files, that work quite nicely under windows 98. It's called sleekv2.zip, or sleekv2.exe, if i recall correctly. W

I normally use mouse-button 2 (right one), and then select the desired action from þe menu. W