Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Joe Forster/STA]

Hi guys,


Having resident data will reduce issues with needing SET /P which
has limitations (e.g. using pipes, which in most DOS command.com
variants need temp files on a writeable drive) and is not in the
classic MS DOS version of command.com (in case somebody tries to
use your batch files to upgrade an existing MS DOS install).

Of course I do not know if ALL instances of SET /P can be avoided
this way, but it would be interesting to hear more about this :-)


I'm not sure what you mean. The batch syntax "[...] | set /p VAR[...]" 
will _always_ create a temporary file (under DOS), as you wrote. Or do 
you think that V8Tools' resident part could preprocess command lines 
(including lines inside batch files) and replace " | set /p VAR[...]" 
parts - starting from the pipe character, not the "set" command! - with 
something else that reroutes command.com to itself (the part responsible 
for "set /p")?


Maybe, preprocess batch files to turn " | set /p" parts into a special 
command (without a pipe), and _patch_a_hook_directly_ into command.com's 
(version/release specific, checks needed) command tokenizer/executor to 
be able to recognize these special commands before command.com tries to. 
Nasty, :-) and I'm not sure if it's worth the trouble.


Under Windows (XP), where I'm using GnuWin32 
(http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net ) heavily but have not yet started using 
a Unix shell (stupid me?), this "set /p" command would've been extremely 
useful _if_ it could also be used as the end of a pipe. (I just checked: 
it doesn't work under Windows 7 either.) So I'm using a program called 
"xset" of my own (as usual, not releaed yet <:-) ) that does what "set 
/p" is supposed to do (and some more), reaching up into its parent 
process and injecting values into the parent process' (usually: cmd.exe 
executing it) environment variable block. Pipes are not as primitive 
under Windows as under DOS, though.



PS: Regarding the block driver discussion, I *guess* that exFAT is
too different from FAT. So a block driver to make it look like FAT
to a DOS kernel would have to trick a lot. Better use CDEX/net API.


Yes, that's what I realized, too. Especially if continuing to other file 
systems, those will be more and more different from FAT(12/16/32), even 
in basic concepts. The limit is there, useful discussion can only be 
about _where_ it is. What? Behind exFAT? It _is_ exFAT. ;-)


Joe
--
KOVÁCS Balázs aka Joe Forster/STA; s...@c64.rulez.org; http://sta.c64.org
Don't E-mail spam, HTML or uncompressed files! More contacts on homepage--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Rugxulo]

Hi,

On Mon, Oct 5, 2015 at 4:44 PM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  wrote:
>
>> On Oct 4, 2015, at 10:02 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
>>
>> It was nice of whomever wrote FreeCOM to include that Windows NT command 
>> interpreter function.

Presumably Stefan Kaiser (who sadly long ago disappeared).

>> I never tested it, but did they also include Delayed Expansion and IF (…) 
>> ELSE (…) and stuff like %~dpn0?
>
> Don’t know.

AFAIK, no, FreeCOM doesn't support any of that.

> As for building them into the shell, there would be definite advantages. 
> Maybe someday.

Nobody ever finished up the (huge) conversion to OpenWatcom. Honestly,
the shell is more complicated to build than the kernel! I mean, I like
compiling stuff, but FreeCOM just scares me. I think it could
definitely be simplified, but I've had other things I'd rather tinker
with.

> For example, right now V8 sits at about 30k total for the binaries. If they 
> were combined
>> and inserted into a shell, they would require about 10k. Between 800-1200 
>> bytes of each
>> is duplicated per tool for command line processing. (varies based on what it 
>> needs to parse)

I already mentioned ARK to you, did you not take a look?

ftp://ftp.sac.sk/pub/sac/pack/ark101.zip

--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Rugxulo]

Hi,

On Mon, Oct 5, 2015 at 2:08 AM, Joe Forster/STA  wrote:
>
> Also, while executing config.sys (_not_ autoexec.bat yet), the (master)
> environment variable block is not pointed to anywhere. I've unable to finish
> another DOS program that would record the boot drive into an environment
> variable so that PATH can later be set in autoexec.bat to  drive>:\[...][;...] (where  can be A: for floppy, C: for hard
> disk etc.)

Assuming "LASTDRIVE=G" (for brevity), do this in AUTOEXEC.BAT (only
with FreeCOM, natch):

for %%z in (a b c d e f g) do if /i "%_CWD%"=="%%z:\" set BOOT=%%z

That's what I use. Of course, then you still have to omit all explicit
drive letters in FDCONFIG.SYS anyways. Still works.

--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Oct 5, 2015, at 8:14 PM, Eric Auer  wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi Jerome,
> 
> combining 20 tools of 1-2 kilobytes each into one tool of 10 kB
> sounds like a good plan and using "residency" sounds even better:
> 

Yes and maybe there will be an edition that does that at some point. 
But, for now that is not what was requested. 

> Outside the floppy world, each of your tools will use at least
> 4 kB because sizes get rounded up to full, often large, clusters.
> 
> Also, having some sort of resident part would allow you to have
> some persistent state between tool invocations. This could be a
> simple memory area that you can allocate and free. I think it is
> not useful to make the whole tool itself stay in RAM for this :-)
> 
> Having resident data will reduce issues with needing SET /P which
> has limitations (e.g. using pipes, which in most DOS command.com
> variants need temp files on a writeable drive) and is not in the
> classic MS DOS version of command.com (in case somebody tries to
> use your batch files to upgrade an existing MS DOS install).

The only tools that will require set /p support for any usable functionality
will be vask (when I get around to making it) and vmath. There are advanced 
functions in vcursor, vfdutil, vgotoxy, vmode, vstr and vchoice that can be
taken advantage of when set /p works. But, for the most part they are
not needed or required to accomplish most things.

Let’s take vchoice for example. You can fairly easily have a area that 
vchoice will use for selection. It will by default output your choice 
as an exit code (errorlevel). No set /p required.

However, if lets say you have displayed 20 file names, your batch file does not
know what the filenames are since you basically are just listing a directories 
contents. You want the user to pick one. If you knew what the names were, 
you could use 20 “if errorlevel n” instructions to set an environment variable
you want to pass as an archive name to the zip utility. If you use the /Q option
on vchoice that text will be sent to STDOUT. So, you could use basically
1 line to achieve something that is not really possible otherwise. Just,
by doing “vchoice /Q | set /p ZARC=“ 

But, like I said this is an advanced function and would not be needed most 
of the time. 

Another example is vfdutil. You can go directly to a drive and path of a
filename. changing the current drive and directory by using “vfdutil /c/p 
%SOMETHING%”.

But, if you want to find out what that path is for doing something like listing 
files there
it requires something like this:

vfdutil /p %SOMETHING% | set /p FPATH=“
dir %FPATH%\*.* >FILELIST.TXT

> 
> Of course I do not know if ALL instances of SET /P can be avoided
> this way, but it would be interesting to hear more about this :-) 

For the most part, it wouldn’t reduce the need for set /p. The only thing that
would really benefit from a resident portion and V8 managing it’s own variables
would be in regards to the vmath utility. Pulling information from  vgotoxy, 
doing some calculations in vmath, then passing that to either vgotoxy or 
vframe, 
could avoid using set /p if V8 had some way to pass data around other then
relying on the shell’s environment. 

But, mostly, stuff ends up needing to use set /p because it has to talk to other
utilities outside of V8. 

> 
> Eric
> 
> 
> 
> PS: Regarding the block driver discussion, I *guess* that exFAT is
> too different from FAT. So a block driver to make it look like FAT
> to a DOS kernel would have to trick a lot. Better use CDEX/net API.
> 
> Easier block cases include "compress a FAT diskimage transparently"
> as we know from stacker / doublespace / drivespace style drivers :-)
> 
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Oct 6, 2015, at 12:12 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> Sometimes doing the "needful" exceeds the "requested". Jim has a vision of 
> what he wants, basically a batch file based simplified install. You (Jerome) 
> have created some very useful utilities for managing the screen and such. 
> 
> My thought was basically to incorporate your V8 tools as a part of FreeCOM to 
> make an "fdinstall.com" (or setup.com) which runs as a shell. The added 
> advantage is that the custom command shell retains the batch and environment 
> functionality, which can ultimately be expanded for other install processes 
> or even package management.

Maybe someday the V8 utilities may make it into a command shell. 
It would be extremely nice to have things like:

vecho “Hello there “ /fRed Anthony /fGray .

to spice up the console. 

> 
> -T
> 
> On Tue, Oct 6, 2015 at 8:55 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
> 
> Hi Jerome, for clarification: I was referring to
> the specific case where your tools are used as a
> part of the install process of FreeDOS :-)
> 
> In your given "pick a file and unzip" example, it
> would be possible to do alternative tricks like:
> 
> VASK-PRO /F *.zip "Pick a file to unzip" "unzip $F"
> 
> The proposed VASK-PRO tool would display a file picker
> (another option could select a directory picker) for
> all files called "*.zip" together with the question
> text in the next option. Once the user picks a file
> (if the user aborts, VASK-PRO just exists) then the
> command "unzip THATFILENAME" will be invoked. Voila,
> a solution without SET /P and without pipelines :-)
> 
> My question was: Which variables do you set using the
> SET /P trick and is it really necessary to have them
> in environment variables? Could you use the values in
> other ways (as in the above example)? Or would it be
> sufficient to have a small RAM storage area to keep
> status of your tools? An obvious example would be the
> cursor case:
> 
> VCURSORX /PUSH /SET=full
> 
> could store the current cursor size in a V-specific
> RAM area and change the cursor to full block size.
> 
> VCURSORX /POP /CLEAN
> 
> could restore the cursor size from that RAM area (if
> none found, do nothing) and deallocate the RAM area
> as far as cursor data is concerned. Of course it is
> not necessary to make a real stack here, probably a
> single cursor size storage slot will be enough.
> 
> Other variations of the same idea will apply to other
> uses of your tools for the installer. My question is:
> 
> Are there installer actions which REQUIRE some SET /P
> support and if no SET /P is available, what is lost?
> 
> > The only tools that will require set /p support for any usable functionality
> > will be vask (when I get around to making it) and vmath. There are advanced
> > functions in vcursor, vfdutil, vgotoxy, vmode, vstr and vchoice that can be
> > taken advantage of when set /p works. But, for the most part they are
> > not needed or required to accomplish most things.
> >
> > Let’s take vchoice for example. You can fairly easily have a area that
> > vchoice will use for selection. It will by default output your choice
> > as an exit code (errorlevel). No set /p required.
> >
> > However, if lets say you have displayed 20 file names, your batch file does 
> > not
> > know what the filenames are since you basically are just listing a 
> > directories
> > contents. You want the user to pick one. If you knew what the names were,
> > you could use 20 “if errorlevel n” instructions to set an environment 
> > variable
> > you want to pass as an archive name to the zip utility. If you use the /Q 
> > option
> > on vchoice that text will be sent to STDOUT. So, you could use basically
> > 1 line to achieve something that is not really possible otherwise. Just,
> > by doing “vchoice /Q | set /p ZARC=“
> >
> > But, like I said this is an advanced function and would not be needed most
> > of the time.
> >
> > Another example is vfdutil. You can go directly to a drive and path of a
> > filename. changing the current drive and directory by using “vfdutil /c/p 
> > %SOMETHING%”.
> 
> You can simply change the active directory to do thisk :-) As there
> is directory stack support (PUSHD, POPD...) in FreeCOM command.com,
> things get even more convenient. Same example, without SET /P usage:
> 
> pushd
> VFDUTIL /PATH /GO-THERE
> dir *.* > x:\filelist.txt
> popd
> 
> Note that I explicitly store the resulting file list in X:, which in
> my example could be a small ramdisk. If the user later has to pick a
> file from that list and unzip it, the example near the beginning of
> my mail can be combined with this to do everything WITHOUT ramdisk.
> 
> On the other hand, if you plan to unzip a file, you probably unzip
> it to the drive where you install DOS, so you can simply use that
> drive for temporary storage of the file list as well... :-)
> 
> > vfdutil /p %SOMETHING% | set /p FPATH=“
> > dir %FPATH%\*.* >FILELIST.TXT

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Oct 6, 2015, at 8:55 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi Jerome, for clarification: I was referring to
> the specific case where your tools are used as a
> part of the install process of FreeDOS :-)

I know, I was just using an easy to state example. :)

> 
> In your given "pick a file and unzip" example, it
> would be possible to do alternative tricks like:
> 
> VASK-PRO /F *.zip "Pick a file to unzip" "unzip $F"
> 
> The proposed VASK-PRO tool would display a file picker
> (another option could select a directory picker) for
> all files called "*.zip" together with the question
> text in the next option. Once the user picks a file
> (if the user aborts, VASK-PRO just exists) then the
> command "unzip THATFILENAME" will be invoked. Voila,
> a solution without SET /P and without pipelines :-)
> 
> My question was: Which variables do you set using the
> SET /P trick and is it really necessary to have them
> in environment variables? Could you use the values in
> other ways (as in the above example)? Or would it be
> sufficient to have a small RAM storage area to keep
> status of your tools? An obvious example would be the
> cursor case:

Post Stage 6, There is some math stuff to simplify creating of 
“window” frames and options.

The installer is extensible. With very little effort. Stage 7
scans the installers directory for and calls each FDASK???.bat
file to query the user on one thing. (Not always, sometimes the
bat will detect things like no os is installed, don’t ask my question.
And, running in basic mode so assume System file transfer and 
don’t ask.) Stage 8, scans that path and all existing drives that
contain a FDSETUP\SETUP directory and includes there 
FDINS???.bat files in the actual install process. All of this 
scanning, enumerating and executing could be accomplished
with another utility. But, that utility would not belong as part of
the V8 toolchain. I’ve used several different methods to accomplish
this scanning. The most reliable (always works as designed) method
requires some stuff using vmath, vstr and set /p. 

> 
> VCURSORX /PUSH /SET=full
> 
> could store the current cursor size in a V-specific
> RAM area and change the cursor to full block size.
> 
> VCURSORX /POP /CLEAN
> 
> could restore the cursor size from that RAM area (if
> none found, do nothing) and deallocate the RAM area
> as far as cursor data is concerned. Of course it is
> not necessary to make a real stack here, probably a
> single cursor size storage slot will be enough.

The only problem doing things this way is the requirement of
a TSR to pass the data around. Every tool in V8 is completely 
stand-alone and requires no other tool in V8. Some, like vchoice
could get rather tricky to use without vframe and vline. But, you
do not need them to use vchoice.

> 
> Other variations of the same idea will apply to other
> uses of your tools for the installer. My question is:
> 
> Are there installer actions which REQUIRE some SET /P
> support and if no SET /P is available, what is lost?

Mostly, this would just break the easy expansion and adding of
options to the installer. It could be hard coded to do a FreeDOS install
without it. But, that would require modifying the main installer logic
everytime anyone wanted to make a minor change to install prompts, 
packages or just about anything else. With the set /p support, the
installer is very flexible and easy to update once there is a basic 
understanding of how to extend it.

> 
>> The only tools that will require set /p support for any usable functionality
>> will be vask (when I get around to making it) and vmath. There are advanced 
>> functions in vcursor, vfdutil, vgotoxy, vmode, vstr and vchoice that can be
>> taken advantage of when set /p works. But, for the most part they are
>> not needed or required to accomplish most things.
>> 
>> Let’s take vchoice for example. You can fairly easily have a area that 
>> vchoice will use for selection. It will by default output your choice 
>> as an exit code (errorlevel). No set /p required.
>> 
>> However, if lets say you have displayed 20 file names, your batch file does 
>> not
>> know what the filenames are since you basically are just listing a 
>> directories 
>> contents. You want the user to pick one. If you knew what the names were, 
>> you could use 20 “if errorlevel n” instructions to set an environment 
>> variable
>> you want to pass as an archive name to the zip utility. If you use the /Q 
>> option
>> on vchoice that text will be sent to STDOUT. So, you could use basically
>> 1 line to achieve something that is not really possible otherwise. Just,
>> by doing “vchoice /Q | set /p ZARC=“ 
>> 
>> But, like I said this is an advanced function and would not be needed most 
>> of the time. 
>> 
>> Another example is vfdutil. You can go directly to a drive and path of a
>> filename. changing the current drive and directory by using “vfdutil /c/p 
>> %SOMETHING%”.
> 
> You can simply change the 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome Shidel]

> On Oct 6, 2015, at 5:41 PM, Rugxulo  wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
>> On Mon, Oct 5, 2015 at 4:44 PM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  
>> wrote:
>> 
>>> On Oct 4, 2015, at 10:02 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
>>> 
>>> It was nice of whomever wrote FreeCOM to include that Windows NT command 
>>> interpreter function.
> 
> Presumably Stefan Kaiser (who sadly long ago disappeared).
> 
>>> I never tested it, but did they also include Delayed Expansion and IF (…) 
>>> ELSE (…) and stuff like %~dpn0?
>> 
>> Don’t know.
> 
> AFAIK, no, FreeCOM doesn't support any of that.
> 
>> As for building them into the shell, there would be definite advantages. 
>> Maybe someday.
> 
> Nobody ever finished up the (huge) conversion to OpenWatcom. Honestly,
> the shell is more complicated to build than the kernel! I mean, I like
> compiling stuff, but FreeCOM just scares me. I think it could
> definitely be simplified, but I've had other things I'd rather tinker
> with.
> 
>> For example, right now V8 sits at about 30k total for the binaries. If they 
>> were combined
>>> and inserted into a shell, they would require about 10k. Between 800-1200 
>>> bytes of each
>>> is duplicated per tool for command line processing. (varies based on what 
>>> it needs to parse)
> 
> I already mentioned ARK to you, did you not take a look?
> 
> ftp://ftp.sac.sk/pub/sac/pack/ark101.zip
> 

I really haven't had the time. But, if I decide to do a all-in-one version, I 
would implement it by adjusting each tool to support being built into a single 
binary. Would not be too difficult. Just time consuming. :)

> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Eric Auer]

Hi Jerome, for clarification: I was referring to
the specific case where your tools are used as a
part of the install process of FreeDOS :-)

In your given "pick a file and unzip" example, it
would be possible to do alternative tricks like:

VASK-PRO /F *.zip "Pick a file to unzip" "unzip $F"

The proposed VASK-PRO tool would display a file picker
(another option could select a directory picker) for
all files called "*.zip" together with the question
text in the next option. Once the user picks a file
(if the user aborts, VASK-PRO just exists) then the
command "unzip THATFILENAME" will be invoked. Voila,
a solution without SET /P and without pipelines :-)

My question was: Which variables do you set using the
SET /P trick and is it really necessary to have them
in environment variables? Could you use the values in
other ways (as in the above example)? Or would it be
sufficient to have a small RAM storage area to keep
status of your tools? An obvious example would be the
cursor case:

VCURSORX /PUSH /SET=full

could store the current cursor size in a V-specific
RAM area and change the cursor to full block size.

VCURSORX /POP /CLEAN

could restore the cursor size from that RAM area (if
none found, do nothing) and deallocate the RAM area
as far as cursor data is concerned. Of course it is
not necessary to make a real stack here, probably a
single cursor size storage slot will be enough.

Other variations of the same idea will apply to other
uses of your tools for the installer. My question is:

Are there installer actions which REQUIRE some SET /P
support and if no SET /P is available, what is lost?

> The only tools that will require set /p support for any usable functionality
> will be vask (when I get around to making it) and vmath. There are advanced 
> functions in vcursor, vfdutil, vgotoxy, vmode, vstr and vchoice that can be
> taken advantage of when set /p works. But, for the most part they are
> not needed or required to accomplish most things.
> 
> Let’s take vchoice for example. You can fairly easily have a area that 
> vchoice will use for selection. It will by default output your choice 
> as an exit code (errorlevel). No set /p required.
> 
> However, if lets say you have displayed 20 file names, your batch file does 
> not
> know what the filenames are since you basically are just listing a 
> directories 
> contents. You want the user to pick one. If you knew what the names were, 
> you could use 20 “if errorlevel n” instructions to set an environment variable
> you want to pass as an archive name to the zip utility. If you use the /Q 
> option
> on vchoice that text will be sent to STDOUT. So, you could use basically
> 1 line to achieve something that is not really possible otherwise. Just,
> by doing “vchoice /Q | set /p ZARC=“ 
> 
> But, like I said this is an advanced function and would not be needed most 
> of the time. 
> 
> Another example is vfdutil. You can go directly to a drive and path of a
> filename. changing the current drive and directory by using “vfdutil /c/p 
> %SOMETHING%”.

You can simply change the active directory to do thisk :-) As there
is directory stack support (PUSHD, POPD...) in FreeCOM command.com,
things get even more convenient. Same example, without SET /P usage:

pushd
VFDUTIL /PATH /GO-THERE
dir *.* > x:\filelist.txt
popd

Note that I explicitly store the resulting file list in X:, which in
my example could be a small ramdisk. If the user later has to pick a
file from that list and unzip it, the example near the beginning of
my mail can be combined with this to do everything WITHOUT ramdisk.

On the other hand, if you plan to unzip a file, you probably unzip
it to the drive where you install DOS, so you can simply use that
drive for temporary storage of the file list as well... :-)

> vfdutil /p %SOMETHING% | set /p FPATH=“
> dir %FPATH%\*.* >FILELIST.TXT

Regarding mathematical and cursor processing: Are you sure that you
have to do this with several tools which have to communicate using
a memory area or environment variables? How about doing ALL steps
for a single cursor move inside a SINGLE call to one of your tools?

This could be for example: VCURSORX /GOTO $WIDTH/2-10 $HEIGHT/2-3
In my example, VCURSORX supports width and height look-ups and some
basic math calculations itself, avoiding the need to pass on data.

Cheers, Eric



--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Antony Gordon]

Hi,

Sometimes doing the "needful" exceeds the "requested". Jim has a vision of
what he wants, basically a batch file based simplified install. You
(Jerome) have created some very useful utilities for managing the screen
and such.

My thought was basically to incorporate your V8 tools as a part of FreeCOM
to make an "fdinstall.com" (or setup.com) which runs as a shell. The added
advantage is that the custom command shell retains the batch and
environment functionality, which can ultimately be expanded for other
install processes or even package management.

-T

On Tue, Oct 6, 2015 at 8:55 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:

>
> Hi Jerome, for clarification: I was referring to
> the specific case where your tools are used as a
> part of the install process of FreeDOS :-)
>
> In your given "pick a file and unzip" example, it
> would be possible to do alternative tricks like:
>
> VASK-PRO /F *.zip "Pick a file to unzip" "unzip $F"
>
> The proposed VASK-PRO tool would display a file picker
> (another option could select a directory picker) for
> all files called "*.zip" together with the question
> text in the next option. Once the user picks a file
> (if the user aborts, VASK-PRO just exists) then the
> command "unzip THATFILENAME" will be invoked. Voila,
> a solution without SET /P and without pipelines :-)
>
> My question was: Which variables do you set using the
> SET /P trick and is it really necessary to have them
> in environment variables? Could you use the values in
> other ways (as in the above example)? Or would it be
> sufficient to have a small RAM storage area to keep
> status of your tools? An obvious example would be the
> cursor case:
>
> VCURSORX /PUSH /SET=full
>
> could store the current cursor size in a V-specific
> RAM area and change the cursor to full block size.
>
> VCURSORX /POP /CLEAN
>
> could restore the cursor size from that RAM area (if
> none found, do nothing) and deallocate the RAM area
> as far as cursor data is concerned. Of course it is
> not necessary to make a real stack here, probably a
> single cursor size storage slot will be enough.
>
> Other variations of the same idea will apply to other
> uses of your tools for the installer. My question is:
>
> Are there installer actions which REQUIRE some SET /P
> support and if no SET /P is available, what is lost?
>
> > The only tools that will require set /p support for any usable
> functionality
> > will be vask (when I get around to making it) and vmath. There are
> advanced
> > functions in vcursor, vfdutil, vgotoxy, vmode, vstr and vchoice that can
> be
> > taken advantage of when set /p works. But, for the most part they are
> > not needed or required to accomplish most things.
> >
> > Let’s take vchoice for example. You can fairly easily have a area that
> > vchoice will use for selection. It will by default output your choice
> > as an exit code (errorlevel). No set /p required.
> >
> > However, if lets say you have displayed 20 file names, your batch file
> does not
> > know what the filenames are since you basically are just listing a
> directories
> > contents. You want the user to pick one. If you knew what the names were,
> > you could use 20 “if errorlevel n” instructions to set an environment
> variable
> > you want to pass as an archive name to the zip utility. If you use the
> /Q option
> > on vchoice that text will be sent to STDOUT. So, you could use basically
> > 1 line to achieve something that is not really possible otherwise. Just,
> > by doing “vchoice /Q | set /p ZARC=“
> >
> > But, like I said this is an advanced function and would not be needed
> most
> > of the time.
> >
> > Another example is vfdutil. You can go directly to a drive and path of a
> > filename. changing the current drive and directory by using “vfdutil
> /c/p %SOMETHING%”.
>
> You can simply change the active directory to do thisk :-) As there
> is directory stack support (PUSHD, POPD...) in FreeCOM command.com,
> things get even more convenient. Same example, without SET /P usage:
>
> pushd
> VFDUTIL /PATH /GO-THERE
> dir *.* > x:\filelist.txt
> popd
>
> Note that I explicitly store the resulting file list in X:, which in
> my example could be a small ramdisk. If the user later has to pick a
> file from that list and unzip it, the example near the beginning of
> my mail can be combined with this to do everything WITHOUT ramdisk.
>
> On the other hand, if you plan to unzip a file, you probably unzip
> it to the drive where you install DOS, so you can simply use that
> drive for temporary storage of the file list as well... :-)
>
> > vfdutil /p %SOMETHING% | set /p FPATH=“
> > dir %FPATH%\*.* >FILELIST.TXT
>
> Regarding mathematical and cursor processing: Are you sure that you
> have to do this with several tools which have to communicate using
> a memory area or environment variables? How about doing ALL steps
> for a single cursor move inside a SINGLE call to one of your tools?
>
> This could be for example: VCURSORX /GOTO 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Joe Forster/STA]

Hi guys,

set /p is a Windows NT feature of CMD.EXE. It was not available in 
MS-DOS or Windows 9x.


And even in Windows XP, it doesn't support capturing the output of a 
command. A small test batch:

--- test.bat ---
@echo off
set X=
echo Y | set /p X=
echo %X%
---
outputs:
---
ECHO is off.
---

It works only if the input comes actually from the user (standard 
input?):

--- test.bat ---
@echo off
set X=
set /p X=X?
echo %X%
---
outputs:
---
X? <= enter "Y" here
Y
---

Regarding finding the master environment, in order for FreeDOS to 
maintain compatibility with MS-DOS and the all the abandoned DOS 
software out there, FreeDOS has to implement SysVars, commonly called 
the List of Lists. This list can?t change it?s structure because by 
doing so, many DOS applications won?t be able to run because a lot of 
them depend on this ?undocumented? (by Microsoft) structure.


Yup, that would be very nice. I have a DOS program that can reassign 
drive letters: http://sta.c64.org/dlmanip.html which relies _heavily_ on 
these data strutures. I'm not sure if I managed to make it work under 
FreeDOS (new version is not released yet).


Also, while executing config.sys (_not_ autoexec.bat yet), the (master) 
environment variable block is not pointed to anywhere. I've unable to 
finish another DOS program that would record the boot drive into an 
environment variable so that PATH can later be set in autoexec.bat to 
:\[...][;...] (where  can be A: for floppy, C: 
for hard disk etc.)


Joe
--
KOVÁCS Balázs aka Joe Forster/STA; s...@c64.rulez.org; http://sta.c64.org
Don't E-mail spam, HTML or uncompressed files! More contacts on homepage--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Oct 4, 2015, at 10:02 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> set /p is a Windows NT feature of CMD.EXE. It was not available in MS-DOS or 
> Windows 9x. 

Ok, I knew it is in a Windows DOS somewhere. Didn’t really pay much attention 
to which one. 

> 
> I even double checked on my Win98 VM and my Win ME VM before I wrote this. 
> (Don’t ask why I have those. Just don’t). I get “Syntax Error” in both 
> Windows 98 and Windows ME.
> 
> It was nice of whomever wrote FreeCOM to include that Windows NT command 
> interpreter function. I never tested it, but did they also include Delayed 
> Expansion and IF (…) ELSE (…) and stuff like %~dpn0?

Don’t know. 

> 
> If the utilities are small as you say, then building a custom FreeCOM with 
> them built in would allow your programs to pass the information without 
> necessarily using the environment. 

-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff18K Sep 28 05:18 LICENSE
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff17K Sep 28 05:18 V8POWER.TXT
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   886B Sep 28 05:18 VASK.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   2.8K Sep 28 05:22 VCHOICE.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.5K Sep 28 05:17 VCLS.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.0K Sep 28 05:18 VCURSOR.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   912B Sep 28 05:17 VDELAY.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.5K Sep 28 05:17 VECHO.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   777B Sep 28 05:17 VERRLVL.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.7K Sep 30 16:36 VFDUTIL.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.7K Sep 28 05:17 VFRAME.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.7K Sep 28 05:17 VGOTOXY.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.8K Sep 28 05:18 VINFO.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.6K Sep 28 05:18 VLINE.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.1K Sep 28 05:17 VMATH.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.8K Sep 28 05:18 VMODE.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.4K Sep 28 05:18 VPAUSE.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.1K Sep 28 05:18 VPCSPKR.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.9K Sep 28 05:18 VPROGRES.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.1K Sep 28 05:17 VSTR.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   1.8K Sep 28 05:18 VVER.COM
-rw-r--r--   1 jerome  staff   886B Sep 28 05:18 VVIEW.COM

A simple TSR that could one could run at the start/end of a batch would be more 
flexible than modifying FreeCOM. Something like “VTSRDATA begin” and “VTSRDATA 
end”. But, you would still be presented with the problem of passing output to 
other command line programs. For example, prompt the user 
for a filename to use as a zip archive before creating it. (There may be a way 
to do it, but this is just a off the top of my head example)

> 
> So assuming your install script always works under FreeCOM, you have 
> guarantees that set /p is there. Assuming it is running under Microsoft’s 
> COMMAND.COM on MS-DOS, you won’t have set /p and your script will fail at 
> stage 7.

Not exactly, stage 6 sets up the support for I/O redirection and set /p support 
under any command shell that supports it. (Basically only FreeCOM). 

Under normal/typical installations, this is not an issue for anyone who would 
be booting off of the install media. 

However, that being said. If for some reason, they do it another way. (i.e., 
just run the installer from an already booted system) Stage 6 also validates
that I/O redirection and set /p are functioning. If not, it terminates the 
installer with an error message telling the user why it could not proceed.

Later, I may place vchoice options in stage 6, that tell the user that they 
cannot proceed with the install using their current config and need to boot
the install media to continue and offer to reboot. 

> 
> 
> If your installer, still using the same batch file, was spawned in a custom 
> command shell, (or FreeCOM), than you can guarantee what you need will be 
> there. 

This may be what I end up doing. Either that or force booting from install 
media.

> 
> Regarding finding the master environment, in order for FreeDOS to maintain 
> compatibility with MS-DOS and the all the abandoned DOS software out there, 
> FreeDOS has to implement SysVars, commonly called the List of Lists. This 
> list can’t change it’s structure because by doing so, many DOS applications 
> won’t be able to run because a lot of them depend on this “undocumented” (by 
> Microsoft) structure.

I hear you. But, I avoid using “undocumented” functions when there is a 
documented solution. 

> 
> I’m not trying to pick a part your program, just trying to point you to a 
> hopefully better implementation. Jim wants a batch file, you have these power 
> tools, why not build them into the interpreter as internal commands? You 
> implement the same code minus the startup functions and you can probably 
> create a “V8” area in DOS memory where the utilities communicate since they 
> are a part of the command shell. 

I understand. 

As for building them into the shell, there would be definite advantages. Maybe 
someday. 
For example, right now V8 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Eric Auer]

Hi Jerome,

combining 20 tools of 1-2 kilobytes each into one tool of 10 kB
sounds like a good plan and using "residency" sounds even better:

Outside the floppy world, each of your tools will use at least
4 kB because sizes get rounded up to full, often large, clusters.

Also, having some sort of resident part would allow you to have
some persistent state between tool invocations. This could be a
simple memory area that you can allocate and free. I think it is
not useful to make the whole tool itself stay in RAM for this :-)

Having resident data will reduce issues with needing SET /P which
has limitations (e.g. using pipes, which in most DOS command.com
variants need temp files on a writeable drive) and is not in the
classic MS DOS version of command.com (in case somebody tries to
use your batch files to upgrade an existing MS DOS install).

Of course I do not know if ALL instances of SET /P can be avoided
this way, but it would be interesting to hear more about this :-)

Eric



PS: Regarding the block driver discussion, I *guess* that exFAT is
too different from FAT. So a block driver to make it look like FAT
to a DOS kernel would have to trick a lot. Better use CDEX/net API.

Easier block cases include "compress a FAT diskimage transparently"
as we know from stacker / doublespace / drivespace style drivers :-)


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Antony Gordon]

If the Int 21h handler is available,  you can use INT 21 AX=3305. DL is
returned with an integer indicating the boot drive (1=A:, etc.). This works
for MS-DOS 4.0 and later. Given that FreeDOS aims for DOS 6+ compatibility
so that functionality should be there.

-T

On Mon, Oct 5, 2015 at 3:05 AM Joe Forster/STA  wrote:

> Hi guys,
>
> > set /p is a Windows NT feature of CMD.EXE. It was not available in
> > MS-DOS or Windows 9x.
>
> And even in Windows XP, it doesn't support capturing the output of a
> command. A small test batch:
> --- test.bat ---
> @echo off
> set X=
> echo Y | set /p X=
> echo %X%
> ---
> outputs:
> ---
> ECHO is off.
> ---
>
> It works only if the input comes actually from the user (standard
> input?):
> --- test.bat ---
> @echo off
> set X=
> set /p X=X?
> echo %X%
> ---
> outputs:
> ---
> X? <= enter "Y" here
> Y
> ---
>
> > Regarding finding the master environment, in order for FreeDOS to
> > maintain compatibility with MS-DOS and the all the abandoned DOS
> > software out there, FreeDOS has to implement SysVars, commonly called
> > the List of Lists. This list can?t change it?s structure because by
> > doing so, many DOS applications won?t be able to run because a lot of
> > them depend on this ?undocumented? (by Microsoft) structure.
>
> Yup, that would be very nice. I have a DOS program that can reassign
> drive letters: http://sta.c64.org/dlmanip.html which relies _heavily_ on
> these data strutures. I'm not sure if I managed to make it work under
> FreeDOS (new version is not released yet).
>
> Also, while executing config.sys (_not_ autoexec.bat yet), the (master)
> environment variable block is not pointed to anywhere. I've unable to
> finish another DOS program that would record the boot drive into an
> environment variable so that PATH can later be set in autoexec.bat to
> :\[...][;...] (where  can be A: for floppy, C:
> for hard disk etc.)
>
> Joe
> --
> KOVÁCS Balázs aka Joe Forster/STA; s...@c64.rulez.org; http://sta.c64.org
> Don't E-mail spam, HTML or uncompressed files! More contacts on
> homepage--
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Bret Johnson]

> Also, while executing config.sys (_not_ autoexec.bat yet), the
> (master) environment variable block is not pointed to anywhere. I've
> unable to finish another DOS program that would record the boot drive
> into an environment variable so that PATH can later be set in
> autoexec.bat to :\[...][;...] (where  can be
> A: for floppy, C: for hard disk etc.)

I actually perform a similar function "manually".  I actually have the "main" 
drive on my systems as "S:" (for System), and use various utilities like SUBST 
or network/VM redirections or similar ways to make sure that happens 
automatically at boot time.  That way, all of my batch files and utilities and 
common procedures I use on a daily basis are always the same no matter how I 
booted.

Meet the Graviteers: Ezekiel Victor
My name is Zeke! I find it hard to pick favorites because I get sick of too 
much of one thing.
http://thirdpartyoffers.juno.com/TGL3141/56129f526d3481f526e7cst04vuc

--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Antony Gordon]

Hi,

set /p is a Windows NT feature of CMD.EXE. It was not available in MS-DOS or 
Windows 9x. 

I even double checked on my Win98 VM and my Win ME VM before I wrote this. 
(Don’t ask why I have those. Just don’t). I get “Syntax Error” in both Windows 
98 and Windows ME.

It was nice of whomever wrote FreeCOM to include that Windows NT command 
interpreter function. I never tested it, but did they also include Delayed 
Expansion and IF (…) ELSE (…) and stuff like %~dpn0?

If the utilities are small as you say, then building a custom FreeCOM with them 
built in would allow your programs to pass the information without necessarily 
using the environment. 

So assuming your install script always works under FreeCOM, you have guarantees 
that set /p is there. Assuming it is running under Microsoft’s COMMAND.COM 
 on MS-DOS, you won’t have set /p and your script will 
fail at stage 7.


If your installer, still using the same batch file, was spawned in a custom 
command shell, (or FreeCOM), than you can guarantee what you need will be 
there. 

Regarding finding the master environment, in order for FreeDOS to maintain 
compatibility with MS-DOS and the all the abandoned DOS software out there, 
FreeDOS has to implement SysVars, commonly called the List of Lists. This list 
can’t change it’s structure because by doing so, many DOS applications won’t be 
able to run because a lot of them depend on this “undocumented” (by Microsoft) 
structure.

I’m not trying to pick a part your program, just trying to point you to a 
hopefully better implementation. Jim wants a batch file, you have these power 
tools, why not build them into the interpreter as internal commands? You 
implement the same code minus the startup functions and you can probably create 
a “V8” area in DOS memory where the utilities communicate since they are a part 
of the command shell. 

This precludes using the environment as you can create an in memory “structure” 
that they can manipulate.


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Oct 3, 2015, at 10:41 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> What if you implemented V8 tools in a customized version of FreeCOM that 
> starts the setup process?

I sorry, but I think I am failing to understand what you are trying to achieve.

The standard FreeCom (COMMAND.COM) that ships with FreeDOS supports set /p. 
There
is no need for a specialized version. set /p is also supported in MS-DOS (I 
think starting with 7
that ships with Windows) 

Actually, 98% of the V8PT don’t even need DOS. Most of it is either directly 
talking to hardware
or using BIOS function calls. At present, most of it should run fine on the 
original 8086 if it has 
MS-DOS 1.00, EGA graphics and 3K free memory. However, some of the utilities 
(like vinfo) will
require DOS 5.00+ compatibility. 

Even without support for set /p, V8 works fine. You just cannot utilize some of 
it’s advanced 
features. This only causes 1 minor issue in the new installer batch, reading 
the cursor shape 
before hiding it. I say it is minor since using "vcursor small” will make it 
visible again and very
similar to the default cursor on most systems. Also, since after the install, 
you should reboot, 
there are really no real side effects from this issue.

The when the installer starts, it does not need support for set /p. If set /p 
is available, then
it will use it to save the cursor. If it is not, it will just assume it needs 
to use the small cursor
on exit. 

Once there is a partitioned and formatted hard disk drive, it initializes a 
installer temporary 
directory on drive C:. Thereby enabling I/O redirection and support for set /p. 
This is what 
occurs in STAGE006 of the installer. All of the stuff the installer does using 
V8PT in STAGE000 
through STAGE005 can get by just fine without set /p and I/O redirection. 

Things start to get complicated in STAGE007. And, for a working intelligent 
batch file based 
installer, I/O redirection and set /p become mandatory. This is fine since 
STAGE006 insures
that they are now functional.

> 
> The other option is to locate the master environment and write what you need 
> there.

There are 3 reasons why I won’t do it this way. 

First, If there are changes or differences 
in how DOS (FreeDOS, PC-DOS, MS-DOS….) it will cause serious issues. To my 
knowledge, there is no standardized way for a program to set a variable in it’s 
parent
environment under DOS. 

2nd, This would increase the size of many of the utilities in V8PT by 
approximately 1000 bytes.
This may not sound like much, but it would nearly double the size of things 
like vcursor.

Finally, it just isn’t necessary when batch files can utilize the set /p option 
to set data in the
environment.

>> On Oct 2, 2015, at 6:44 PM, Jerome Shidel  wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> On Oct 2, 2015, at 6:26 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
>> 
>>> Hey,
>>> 
>>> Couldn't you use 4DOS as the command shell during the installation process?
>>> 
>> Unfortunately, no. 
>> 
>> Some of the things that need to be done require I/O redirection (pipes and 
>> such) and using the output of some process to set the values of environment 
>> variables. This does not work using the 4DOS shell. 
>> 
>> V8Power Tools work fine. However, there is no way to make any use of many of 
>> their advanced features without this capability. 
>> 
>> For example, when using the standard command.com in FreeDOS and with MS-DOS 
>> (I think 7, with XP), you can do smithing like this to hide and restore the 
>> current cursor.
>> 
>> vcursor | set /p OldCursor=
>> vcursor hide
>> rem do stuff with hidden cursor
>> vcursor %OldCursor%
>> set OldCursor=
>> 
>> The cursor would be read, stored, hidden then restored to its original 
>> state. 
>> 
>>> On Oct 2, 2015 1:18 PM, "Jerome E. Shidel Jr."  wrote:
>>> Well, best guess. I’m 70% done with the installer.
>>> 
>>> Just need to port the backup creation code, the system files transfer stuff 
>>> and example package/zip installer portion.
>>> 
>>> But, the readme on using it for the OS release is mostly done. 
>>> 
>>> https://github.com/shidel/FDI/blob/master/README.md
>>> 
>>> FreeDOS 1.2 Installer Prototype
>>> 
>>> This project is for creating the FreeDOS 1.2+ installation kit based on 
>>> V8Power Tools batch file enhancement utilities.
>>> 
>>> File List
>>> 
>>> README.md   - This file.
>>> LICENSE - GNU GPL v2.
>>> mkFDI.bat   - Create the Floppy installation media.
>>> 
>>> Build files in INSFILES\
>>> 
>>> MKBIN.LSTList of files copyied from C:\FDOS\BIN\ to A:\FDSETUP\BIN\
>>> MKHELP.LST   List of files copyied from C:\FDOS\HELP\ to A:\FDSETUP\HELP\
>>> MKV8P.LSTList of files copyied from V8POWER\ to A:\FDSETUP\V8POWER\
>>> MKSETUP.LST  List of files copyied from INSFILES\ to A:\FDSETUP\SETUP\
>>> AUTOEXEC.BAT Copied as-is to A:\
>>> FDCONFIG.SYS Copied as-is to A:\
>>> SETUP.BATCopied as-is to A:\
>>> 
>>> What the installer does.
>>> 
>>> 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Antony Gordon]

Hi,

What if you implemented V8 tools in a customized version of FreeCOM that starts 
the setup process?

The other option is to locate the master environment and write what you need 
there.
> On Oct 2, 2015, at 6:44 PM, Jerome Shidel  wrote:
> 
> 
> On Oct 2, 2015, at 6:26 PM, Antony Gordon  > wrote:
> 
>> Hey,
>> 
>> Couldn't you use 4DOS as the command shell during the installation process?
>> 
> Unfortunately, no. 
> 
> Some of the things that need to be done require I/O redirection (pipes and 
> such) and using the output of some process to set the values of environment 
> variables. This does not work using the 4DOS shell. 
> 
> V8Power Tools work fine. However, there is no way to make any use of many of 
> their advanced features without this capability. 
> 
> For example, when using the standard command.com  in 
> FreeDOS and with MS-DOS (I think 7, with XP), you can do smithing like this 
> to hide and restore the current cursor.
> 
> vcursor | set /p OldCursor=
> vcursor hide
> rem do stuff with hidden cursor
> vcursor %OldCursor%
> set OldCursor=
> 
> The cursor would be read, stored, hidden then restored to its original state. 
> 
>> On Oct 2, 2015 1:18 PM, "Jerome E. Shidel Jr." > > wrote:
>> Well, best guess. I’m 70% done with the installer.
>> 
>> Just need to port the backup creation code, the system files transfer stuff 
>> and example package/zip installer portion.
>> 
>> But, the readme on using it for the OS release is mostly done. 
>> 
>> https://github.com/shidel/FDI/blob/master/README.md 
>> 
>> 
>> FreeDOS 1.2 Installer Prototype
>> 
>> This project is for creating the FreeDOS  1.2+ 
>> installation kit based on V8Power Tools  batch 
>> file enhancement utilities.
>> 
>>  File List
>> 
>> README.md   - This file.
>> LICENSE - GNU GPL v2.
>> mkFDI.bat   - Create the Floppy installation media.
>>  
>> Build
>>  files in INSFILES\
>> 
>> MKBIN.LSTList of files copyied from C:\FDOS\BIN\ to A:\FDSETUP\BIN\
>> MKHELP.LST   List of files copyied from C:\FDOS\HELP\ to A:\FDSETUP\HELP\
>> MKV8P.LSTList of files copyied from V8POWER\ to A:\FDSETUP\V8POWER\
>> MKSETUP.LST  List of files copyied from INSFILES\ to A:\FDSETUP\SETUP\
>> AUTOEXEC.BAT Copied as-is to A:\
>> FDCONFIG.SYS Copied as-is to A:\
>> SETUP.BATCopied as-is to A:\
>>  
>> What
>>  the installer does.
>> 
>> AUTOEXEC.BAT calls SETUP.BAT RECOVERY
>> 
>> SETUP.BAT
>> 
>> Tests for presence of V8Power Tools.
>> Tests for I/O redirection support at present.
>> Does some basic settings initialization.
>> 
>> Loads configuration from STAGE000.BAT. This is where some of the
>> built-in default settings are stored. Things like New Volume Label,
>> OS Version and etc.
>> 
>> if RECOVERY option was present at launceh, tests if this version of
>> FreeDOS is already installed using STAGE001. If so, just exists to
>> prompt with a welcome message. Otherwise, proceeds with installer.
>> 
>> STAGE002, Loads current color scheme from either THEMENUL.BAT or
>> if THEMEADV.BAT (Advanced Mode).
>> 
>> STAGE003, Displays welcome to FreeDOS installer message. Offers to
>> continue or exit.
>> 
>> STAGE004, Checks if drive C exists. If not prompts user that C needs
>> partitioned and offers to run fdisk or exit. If user selects fdisk,
>> then offers to reboot or exit.
>> 
>> STAGE005, Checks if drive C is readble. If not prompts user that C
>> needs formatted and offers to format or exit. If user selects formats,
>> then rechecks if C is readble. If not, offers to reboot or exit.
>> 
>> STAGE006, Sets up temporary TEMP Directory so I/O redirection can
>> function and for storage of a couple temporary files. If I/O
>> redirection is still unavailable, it will abort the installation.
>> 
>> NOTE: Now that a TEMP directory exists,  FDIWIND.BAT and other
>> batch files that use I/O redirection for utilities like vmath can
>> now be used.
>> 
>> STAGE007, Calls all Installation configuration batch files named
>> FDASK???.BAT located in the FDSETUP\SETUP directory.
>> 
>> STAGE008, Prompts user that installation will now begin, Offers
>> to continue or exit. Then, scans current FDSETUP\SETUP for all
>> FDINS???.BAT files. The scans all other drives for
>> \FDSETUP\SETUP\FDINS???.BAT files and calls them in that order to
>> perform the installation.
>> 
>> STAGE009, Informs user that instalation is complete offers reboot or
>> exit.
>> 
>> STAGE999, 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Antony Gordon]

Hey,

Couldn't you use 4DOS as the command shell during the installation process?
On Oct 2, 2015 1:18 PM, "Jerome E. Shidel Jr."  wrote:

> Well, best guess. I’m 70% done with the installer.
>
> Just need to port the backup creation code, the system files transfer
> stuff and example package/zip installer portion.
>
> But, the readme on using it for the OS release is mostly done.
>
> https://github.com/shidel/FDI/blob/master/README.md
>
> FreeDOS 1.2 Installer Prototype
>
> This project is for creating the FreeDOS  1.2+
> installation kit based on V8Power Tools  batch
> file enhancement utilities.
> --
> File List
>
> README.md   - This file.
> LICENSE - GNU GPL v2.
> mkFDI.bat   - Create the Floppy installation media.
>
>
> Build
> files in INSFILES\
>
> MKBIN.LSTList of files copyied from C:\FDOS\BIN\ to A:\FDSETUP\BIN\
> MKHELP.LST   List of files copyied from C:\FDOS\HELP\ to A:\FDSETUP\HELP\
> MKV8P.LSTList of files copyied from V8POWER\ to A:\FDSETUP\V8POWER\
> MKSETUP.LST  List of files copyied from INSFILES\ to A:\FDSETUP\SETUP\
> AUTOEXEC.BAT Copied as-is to A:\
> FDCONFIG.SYS Copied as-is to A:\
> SETUP.BATCopied as-is to A:\
>
>
> What
> the installer does.
>
> AUTOEXEC.BAT calls SETUP.BAT RECOVERY
>
> SETUP.BAT
>
> Tests for presence of V8Power Tools.
> Tests for I/O redirection support at present.
> Does some basic settings initialization.
>
> Loads configuration from STAGE000.BAT. This is where some of the
> built-in default settings are stored. Things like New Volume Label,
> OS Version and etc.
>
> if RECOVERY option was present at launceh, tests if this version of
> FreeDOS is already installed using STAGE001. If so, just exists to
> prompt with a welcome message. Otherwise, proceeds with installer.
>
> STAGE002, Loads current color scheme from either THEMENUL.BAT or
> if THEMEADV.BAT (Advanced Mode).
>
> STAGE003, Displays welcome to FreeDOS installer message. Offers to
> continue or exit.
>
> STAGE004, Checks if drive C exists. If not prompts user that C needs
> partitioned and offers to run fdisk or exit. If user selects fdisk,
> then offers to reboot or exit.
>
> STAGE005, Checks if drive C is readble. If not prompts user that C
> needs formatted and offers to format or exit. If user selects formats,
> then rechecks if C is readble. If not, offers to reboot or exit.
>
> STAGE006, Sets up temporary TEMP Directory so I/O redirection can
> function and for storage of a couple temporary files. If I/O
> redirection is still unavailable, it will abort the installation.
>
> NOTE: Now that a TEMP directory exists,  FDIWIND.BAT and other
> batch files that use I/O redirection for utilities like vmath can
> now be used.
>
> STAGE007, Calls all Installation configuration batch files named
> FDASK???.BAT located in the FDSETUP\SETUP directory.
>
> STAGE008, Prompts user that installation will now begin, Offers
> to continue or exit. Then, scans current FDSETUP\SETUP for all
> FDINS???.BAT files. The scans all other drives for
> \FDSETUP\SETUP\FDINS???.BAT files and calls them in that order to
> perform the installation.
>
> STAGE009, Informs user that instalation is complete offers reboot or
> exit.
>
> STAGE999, Performs cleanup and is always run. It is only not run
> if the STAGE001 test for existing OS installation passes and the
> batch script is exiting without running the installer.
>
> If user had selected reboot in STAGE009, it is done now.
>
>
> Some
> global environment variables.
>
> OS_NAME = Should always be "FreeDOS"
> OS_VERSION  = Current OS Version.
>
> FADV= "y" if running in advanced mode.
> FDIDFMT = "y" if during this execution the batch file formatted
> drive C.
> FWAIT   = If your going to use vpause, This is how many seconds you
> should pause. Example: vpause /t %FWAIT%
>
>
> Options
> configured by FDASK???.BAT files.
>
> OVOLIf drive is formatted, set its labal to this text
> (actually OVOL is set in STAGE000)
>
> OBAKSet in FDASK000. If an operating system is detected.
> and user selects backup it will be set to "y". In advanced
> mode user can select 'archive to zip' then it is set as
> "z". If no OS was detected, or uses selects no backup it
> will be 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome Shidel]

> On Oct 2, 2015, at 6:26 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
> 
> Hey,
> 
> Couldn't you use 4DOS as the command shell during the installation process?
> 
Unfortunately, no. 

Some of the things that need to be done require I/O redirection (pipes and 
such) and using the output of some process to set the values of environment 
variables. This does not work using the 4DOS shell. 

V8Power Tools work fine. However, there is no way to make any use of many of 
their advanced features without this capability. 

For example, when using the standard command.com in FreeDOS and with MS-DOS (I 
think 7, with XP), you can do smithing like this to hide and restore the 
current cursor.

vcursor | set /p OldCursor=
vcursor hide
rem do stuff with hidden cursor
vcursor %OldCursor%
set OldCursor=

The cursor would be read, stored, hidden then restored to its original state. 

>> On Oct 2, 2015 1:18 PM, "Jerome E. Shidel Jr."  wrote:
>> Well, best guess. I’m 70% done with the installer.
>> 
>> Just need to port the backup creation code, the system files transfer stuff 
>> and example package/zip installer portion.
>> 
>> But, the readme on using it for the OS release is mostly done. 
>> 
>> https://github.com/shidel/FDI/blob/master/README.md
>> 
>> FreeDOS 1.2 Installer Prototype
>> This project is for creating the FreeDOS 1.2+ installation kit based on 
>> V8Power Tools batch file enhancement utilities.
>> 
>> File List
>> 
>> README.md   - This file.
>> LICENSE - GNU GPL v2.
>> mkFDI.bat   - Create the Floppy installation media.
>> Build files in INSFILES\
>> 
>> MKBIN.LSTList of files copyied from C:\FDOS\BIN\ to A:\FDSETUP\BIN\
>> MKHELP.LST   List of files copyied from C:\FDOS\HELP\ to A:\FDSETUP\HELP\
>> MKV8P.LSTList of files copyied from V8POWER\ to A:\FDSETUP\V8POWER\
>> MKSETUP.LST  List of files copyied from INSFILES\ to A:\FDSETUP\SETUP\
>> AUTOEXEC.BAT Copied as-is to A:\
>> FDCONFIG.SYS Copied as-is to A:\
>> SETUP.BATCopied as-is to A:\
>> What the installer does.
>> 
>> AUTOEXEC.BAT calls SETUP.BAT RECOVERY
>> 
>> SETUP.BAT
>> 
>> Tests for presence of V8Power Tools.
>> Tests for I/O redirection support at present.
>> Does some basic settings initialization.
>> 
>> Loads configuration from STAGE000.BAT. This is where some of the
>> built-in default settings are stored. Things like New Volume Label,
>> OS Version and etc.
>> 
>> if RECOVERY option was present at launceh, tests if this version of
>> FreeDOS is already installed using STAGE001. If so, just exists to
>> prompt with a welcome message. Otherwise, proceeds with installer.
>> 
>> STAGE002, Loads current color scheme from either THEMENUL.BAT or
>> if THEMEADV.BAT (Advanced Mode).
>> 
>> STAGE003, Displays welcome to FreeDOS installer message. Offers to
>> continue or exit.
>> 
>> STAGE004, Checks if drive C exists. If not prompts user that C needs
>> partitioned and offers to run fdisk or exit. If user selects fdisk,
>> then offers to reboot or exit.
>> 
>> STAGE005, Checks if drive C is readble. If not prompts user that C
>> needs formatted and offers to format or exit. If user selects formats,
>> then rechecks if C is readble. If not, offers to reboot or exit.
>> 
>> STAGE006, Sets up temporary TEMP Directory so I/O redirection can
>> function and for storage of a couple temporary files. If I/O
>> redirection is still unavailable, it will abort the installation.
>> 
>> NOTE: Now that a TEMP directory exists,  FDIWIND.BAT and other
>> batch files that use I/O redirection for utilities like vmath can
>> now be used.
>> 
>> STAGE007, Calls all Installation configuration batch files named
>> FDASK???.BAT located in the FDSETUP\SETUP directory.
>> 
>> STAGE008, Prompts user that installation will now begin, Offers
>> to continue or exit. Then, scans current FDSETUP\SETUP for all
>> FDINS???.BAT files. The scans all other drives for
>> \FDSETUP\SETUP\FDINS???.BAT files and calls them in that order to
>> perform the installation.
>> 
>> STAGE009, Informs user that instalation is complete offers reboot or
>> exit.
>> 
>> STAGE999, Performs cleanup and is always run. It is only not run
>> if the STAGE001 test for existing OS installation passes and the
>> batch script is exiting without running the installer.
>> 
>> If user had selected reboot in STAGE009, it is done now.
>> Some global environment variables.
>> 
>> OS_NAME = Should always be "FreeDOS"
>> OS_VERSION  = Current OS Version.
>> 
>> FADV= "y" if running in advanced mode.
>> FDIDFMT = "y" if during this execution the batch file formatted
>> drive C.
>> FWAIT   = If your going to use vpause, This is how many seconds you
>> should pause. Example: vpause /t %FWAIT%
>> Options configured by FDASK???.BAT files.
>> 
>> OVOL   

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Oct 1, 2015, at 5:46 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi Jerome, thanks for your work on your installer :-)

Welcome. :^)

> 
>> 1) boots from floppy or floppy image (like boot CD)
>> 
>> (Note: if user manually lauches installer, skip 2 and goto 3)
>> 
>> 2) Detects if latest FreeDOS version is installed (actual test not
>> written) If it is the latest version, returns to prompt with welcome
>> message. If not installer continues.
> 
> You have to skip this: After booting from the floppy or
> CD, you always run the DOS from there, so the answer to
> this question always is the same. Plus you say that you
> skip step 2 if the installer is manually launched from
> an existing DOS install.

At present, this is skipped. However, when written will probably use 
something like and test for ID file and it’s version. Something like:

C:\FDOS\VERSION.FDI = 1.2, otherwise continue.

> 
>> 3) Welcomes user to installer and asks if the want to continue. If
>> no, returns to prompt with install aborted message.
> 
> I would ask that later…

Basically, this is just the welcome to the installer screen.

> 
>> 4) Checks for drive C’s existence. If it exists, skip to 7.
> 
> If you booted the installer from USB, C: might be the USB.
> It may be better to let the user select other targets here.

It is possible that C can be a USB stick or something else. 

The Default "Quick and Friendly” version will NOT offer a list 
of drive targets. However, it may make it into the advanced mode
at some point.

> 
>> 5) Informs user they need to partition and offers to run
>> partitioner. if yes, runs fdisk. If no, returns to prompt
>> with abort message.
> 
> Too dangerous. Only offer automatic partition / format after
> making 100% sure that the main disk (BIOS drive 0x80) neither
> has MBR nor GPT partitions at all yet. Otherwise, drop the
> user to a prompt and suggest that they use tools in their
> other operating systems to shrink existing partitions and
> make a FAT32 partition for DOS. Tell them that, at the cost
> of losing their existing data, they could also use DOS fdisk
> and format for that.

I put  a lot of though into this aspect of the installer and would have 
to disagree a little with you here. First, I feel that a completely 
automatic method of partitioning you drives  is extremely dangerous. 
What to keep, what to destroy. I cringe at the thought of that. Go take 
a a peek at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partition_type and then 
tell me you want to deal with it automatically. :)

I think for the most part, there will be 3 types of installs.

1) Single OS, Virtual Machine.
2) Possible single OS, Hobby machines.
3) Dedicated systems.

I don’t think that doing Multi-boot with Windows 10 is as likely as it
used to be.  For the most part, those would be people who want to
run older DOS games. They would probably either use a full VM 
with FreeDOS or plain old DOSBox.

> 
>> 6) Partitioner runs, then asked user to reboot. if yes, reboots
>> if no, returns to prompt with abort message.  7) Checks if C is
>> formatted. if yes, skip to 9.  8) offers to format or exit to
>> prompt.
> 
> See above.

There really isn’t a good way to determine if what DOS sees as 
drive C is the first BIOS HDD. This is the reason I dropped development
of the CheckHDD utility. 

Let’s take the rare Multi-Boot scenario. Using Grub, Lilo or other boot loader:

BIOS drive 0x80, has windows ntfs and an extended linux, swap and fat 32 
partition.
BIOS drive 0x81, has freedos and extended fat 32 partition.

FreeDOS will assign the drives like this:

BIOS 0x80, ??, ??, ?? and D:
BIOS 0x81, C: and E:

Drive C: is on 0x81 and is perfectly fine. So, drive 0x81 partition 0 needs 
formatted for dos. But, this all goes away if you just ask DOS, hey is C: 
formatted.

> 
>> ——— to do ———
>> 
>> 9) Offer backup.
> 
> Allow the user to select a target drive and directory, not
> necessarily C: and FDOS (or FREEDOS?). Check if the target
> exists. If no, make directory. If yes, check if it already
> uses LSM to track installed packages. If yes, do smoother
> upgrade by upgrading installed packages and adding those
> which were not yet installed. If no, ask if old directory
> should be just overwritten or moved away before backup. In
> all cases, if user opts for backup, offer either renaming
> or zipping of the directory, with file-name-anti-collider.

No target folder’s will be offered in the “Quick and Easy” version.
Maybe, they will make it into the advanced mode.

The architecture of the new installer won’t care what scheme of
package management is used by the Release. 

The “Quick and Easy” version will not offer types of backups or 
id it should overwrite the old files. It will simple move the conflicting
FDOS directory to FDOS.OLD. 

The “Advanced” mode will offer renaming, zipping or overwritten.

> 
>> 10) install.
> 
> Give a choice of BASE (explain that this is all that you
> need for standard DOS and that you can always 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

I missed a ")" in my sentence.Oh well. :)

On Thu, Oct 1, 2015 at 12:45 PM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU <
jcharbonnea...@cpsge.org> wrote:

> Visual BASIC 1.0 is a great compiler for GUI apps on DOS.(However,the EXEs
> take up quite a bit of memory.) In fact,our FDSHELL was compiled in Visual
> BASIC 1.0. Perhaps implementing a Visual BASIC installer,keeping the
> installer as a single EXE? (Advanced options can be shown by typing
> "Install /A" or something of the liking.As to Rugluxio,I was trying to
> Install FreeDOS from my flash drive because my Lil' HP (I think that laptop
> is becoming a celibrity at this point lol) has no DVD ports.
>
> On Thu, Oct 1, 2015 at 11:51 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
>
>>
>> Hi Jerome,
>>
>> basically the "is the newest DOS already installed" check
>> has to wait for the target selection. Plus it should not
>> be necessary to use black magic* for this: I would prefer
>> if the installer only checks if a DOS with LSM & package
>> manager data structures is installed or not. Then other
>> aspects of how new which package is can be handled by the
>> package manager itself anyway.
>>
>> Regarding the partition check: I agree that automatic is
>> too dangerous. This is exactly why I suggest that even a
>> menu option to start FDISK or FORMAT should NOT be visible
>> by default. It should ONLY be visible after making sure
>> that the target disk does not contain any partitions yet.
>>
>> In all other cases, I suggest to leave the installer and
>> give the user full choice of what to do next - the user
>> could start FDISK or FORMAT manually, or the user (which
>> would be a better choice IMHO) could use GPARTED of Linux
>> or the partition manager of Windows to non-destructively
>> add a FAT32 partition for DOS without damaging others :-)
>>
>> > The Default "Quick and Friendly” version will NOT offer a list
>> > of drive targets. However, it may make it into the advanced mode
>> > at some point.
>>
>> You could make C:\FDOS the default and still make the field
>> editable, to avoid having too many easy/advanced differences.
>>
>> Cheers, Eric
>>
>> PS: Checking for already installed DOS is mostly to avoid
>> boot loops when the user forgets to remove the CD after a
>> DOS install and reboot and even then the user may want to
>> re-run the installer if they have forgotten some packages.
>>
>> > Let’s take the rare Multi-Boot scenario. Using Grub, Lilo or other boot
>> loader:
>> >
>> > BIOS drive 0x80, has windows ntfs and an extended linux, swap and fat
>> 32 partition.
>> > BIOS drive 0x81, has freedos and extended fat 32 partition.
>> >
>> > FreeDOS will assign the drives like this:
>> >
>> > BIOS 0x80, ??, ??, ?? and D:
>> > BIOS 0x81, C: and E:
>> >
>> > Drive C: is on 0x81 and is perfectly fine. So, drive 0x81 partition 0
>> needs
>> > formatted for dos. But, this all goes away if you just ask DOS, hey is
>> C: formatted.
>>
>> Some kernel experts may want to comment on this :-)
>>
>> > No target folder’s will be offered in the “Quick and Easy” version.
>>
>> You would still have to tell the user what happens...
>>
>> > The architecture of the new installer won’t care what scheme of
>> > package management is used by the Release.
>>
>> Then you miss many advantages of our package managers.
>>
>> > The “Quick and Easy” version will not offer types of backups or
>> > id it should overwrite the old files. It will simple move the
>> > conflicting FDOS directory to FDOS.OLD.
>>
>> Acceptable, I guess...
>>
>> > The “Advanced” mode will offer renaming, zipping or overwritten.
>>
>> [and it]
>>
>> > Provides more detailed options and a different color scheme.
>>
>> As mentioned, I think you could keep everything in 1
>> mode: The difference would only be that the user can
>> decide whether to accept a default and hit the "next"
>> button or rather "advancedly"  modify settings first.
>>
>> As you already explain, advanced just means modifying
>> more settings. I would prefer if all possible settings
>> are always visible, but the user at the same time is
>> informed that they can stick to the defaults often :-)
>>
>> For example with a Linux installer, you would have a
>> choice in which country you are first. Then later, a
>> menu would show which time zone and keyboard layout
>> are active, but for most users, this will just be an
>> information screen. Very few would use the opportunity
>> to MODIFY the time zone and keyboard layout. Still, it
>> is nice that they CAN do it, without extra screens :-)
>>
>> > However, restricting V8PT to use no TSRs, RAM or DISK Storage and
>> > still run as little utilities to extend batch files, doing multiple
>> things on the
>> > same screen is not a viable option. I have thought of ways around this
>> > problem. However, they either require some sort of storage or break
>> > the vchoice, vecho… utility extension metaphor.
>>
>> To be honest, BAT is not a sufficiently powerful language
>> to make user friendly menu systems. With 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Eric Auer]

Hi Jerome,

basically the "is the newest DOS already installed" check
has to wait for the target selection. Plus it should not
be necessary to use black magic* for this: I would prefer
if the installer only checks if a DOS with LSM & package
manager data structures is installed or not. Then other
aspects of how new which package is can be handled by the
package manager itself anyway.

Regarding the partition check: I agree that automatic is
too dangerous. This is exactly why I suggest that even a
menu option to start FDISK or FORMAT should NOT be visible
by default. It should ONLY be visible after making sure
that the target disk does not contain any partitions yet.

In all other cases, I suggest to leave the installer and
give the user full choice of what to do next - the user
could start FDISK or FORMAT manually, or the user (which
would be a better choice IMHO) could use GPARTED of Linux
or the partition manager of Windows to non-destructively
add a FAT32 partition for DOS without damaging others :-)

> The Default "Quick and Friendly” version will NOT offer a list 
> of drive targets. However, it may make it into the advanced mode
> at some point.

You could make C:\FDOS the default and still make the field
editable, to avoid having too many easy/advanced differences.

Cheers, Eric

PS: Checking for already installed DOS is mostly to avoid
boot loops when the user forgets to remove the CD after a
DOS install and reboot and even then the user may want to
re-run the installer if they have forgotten some packages.

> Let’s take the rare Multi-Boot scenario. Using Grub, Lilo or other boot 
> loader:
> 
> BIOS drive 0x80, has windows ntfs and an extended linux, swap and fat 32 
> partition.
> BIOS drive 0x81, has freedos and extended fat 32 partition.
> 
> FreeDOS will assign the drives like this:
> 
> BIOS 0x80, ??, ??, ?? and D:
> BIOS 0x81, C: and E:
> 
> Drive C: is on 0x81 and is perfectly fine. So, drive 0x81 partition 0 needs 
> formatted for dos. But, this all goes away if you just ask DOS, hey is C: 
> formatted.

Some kernel experts may want to comment on this :-)

> No target folder’s will be offered in the “Quick and Easy” version.

You would still have to tell the user what happens...

> The architecture of the new installer won’t care what scheme of
> package management is used by the Release. 

Then you miss many advantages of our package managers.

> The “Quick and Easy” version will not offer types of backups or 
> id it should overwrite the old files. It will simple move the
> conflicting FDOS directory to FDOS.OLD. 

Acceptable, I guess...

> The “Advanced” mode will offer renaming, zipping or overwritten.

[and it]

> Provides more detailed options and a different color scheme.

As mentioned, I think you could keep everything in 1
mode: The difference would only be that the user can
decide whether to accept a default and hit the "next"
button or rather "advancedly"  modify settings first.

As you already explain, advanced just means modifying
more settings. I would prefer if all possible settings
are always visible, but the user at the same time is
informed that they can stick to the defaults often :-)

For example with a Linux installer, you would have a
choice in which country you are first. Then later, a
menu would show which time zone and keyboard layout
are active, but for most users, this will just be an
information screen. Very few would use the opportunity
to MODIFY the time zone and keyboard layout. Still, it
is nice that they CAN do it, without extra screens :-)

> However, restricting V8PT to use no TSRs, RAM or DISK Storage and
> still run as little utilities to extend batch files, doing multiple things on 
> the 
> same screen is not a viable option. I have thought of ways around this 
> problem. However, they either require some sort of storage or break
> the vchoice, vecho… utility extension metaphor. 

To be honest, BAT is not a sufficiently powerful language
to make user friendly menu systems. With some extra tools
it is enough for the occasional "are you sure" pop-up etc.

Cheers, Eric

*such as having magic files specific to your distro version.


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

Visual BASIC 1.0 is a great compiler for GUI apps on DOS.(However,the EXEs
take up quite a bit of memory.) In fact,our FDSHELL was compiled in Visual
BASIC 1.0. Perhaps implementing a Visual BASIC installer,keeping the
installer as a single EXE? (Advanced options can be shown by typing
"Install /A" or something of the liking.As to Rugluxio,I was trying to
Install FreeDOS from my flash drive because my Lil' HP (I think that laptop
is becoming a celibrity at this point lol) has no DVD ports.

On Thu, Oct 1, 2015 at 11:51 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:

>
> Hi Jerome,
>
> basically the "is the newest DOS already installed" check
> has to wait for the target selection. Plus it should not
> be necessary to use black magic* for this: I would prefer
> if the installer only checks if a DOS with LSM & package
> manager data structures is installed or not. Then other
> aspects of how new which package is can be handled by the
> package manager itself anyway.
>
> Regarding the partition check: I agree that automatic is
> too dangerous. This is exactly why I suggest that even a
> menu option to start FDISK or FORMAT should NOT be visible
> by default. It should ONLY be visible after making sure
> that the target disk does not contain any partitions yet.
>
> In all other cases, I suggest to leave the installer and
> give the user full choice of what to do next - the user
> could start FDISK or FORMAT manually, or the user (which
> would be a better choice IMHO) could use GPARTED of Linux
> or the partition manager of Windows to non-destructively
> add a FAT32 partition for DOS without damaging others :-)
>
> > The Default "Quick and Friendly” version will NOT offer a list
> > of drive targets. However, it may make it into the advanced mode
> > at some point.
>
> You could make C:\FDOS the default and still make the field
> editable, to avoid having too many easy/advanced differences.
>
> Cheers, Eric
>
> PS: Checking for already installed DOS is mostly to avoid
> boot loops when the user forgets to remove the CD after a
> DOS install and reboot and even then the user may want to
> re-run the installer if they have forgotten some packages.
>
> > Let’s take the rare Multi-Boot scenario. Using Grub, Lilo or other boot
> loader:
> >
> > BIOS drive 0x80, has windows ntfs and an extended linux, swap and fat 32
> partition.
> > BIOS drive 0x81, has freedos and extended fat 32 partition.
> >
> > FreeDOS will assign the drives like this:
> >
> > BIOS 0x80, ??, ??, ?? and D:
> > BIOS 0x81, C: and E:
> >
> > Drive C: is on 0x81 and is perfectly fine. So, drive 0x81 partition 0
> needs
> > formatted for dos. But, this all goes away if you just ask DOS, hey is
> C: formatted.
>
> Some kernel experts may want to comment on this :-)
>
> > No target folder’s will be offered in the “Quick and Easy” version.
>
> You would still have to tell the user what happens...
>
> > The architecture of the new installer won’t care what scheme of
> > package management is used by the Release.
>
> Then you miss many advantages of our package managers.
>
> > The “Quick and Easy” version will not offer types of backups or
> > id it should overwrite the old files. It will simple move the
> > conflicting FDOS directory to FDOS.OLD.
>
> Acceptable, I guess...
>
> > The “Advanced” mode will offer renaming, zipping or overwritten.
>
> [and it]
>
> > Provides more detailed options and a different color scheme.
>
> As mentioned, I think you could keep everything in 1
> mode: The difference would only be that the user can
> decide whether to accept a default and hit the "next"
> button or rather "advancedly"  modify settings first.
>
> As you already explain, advanced just means modifying
> more settings. I would prefer if all possible settings
> are always visible, but the user at the same time is
> informed that they can stick to the defaults often :-)
>
> For example with a Linux installer, you would have a
> choice in which country you are first. Then later, a
> menu would show which time zone and keyboard layout
> are active, but for most users, this will just be an
> information screen. Very few would use the opportunity
> to MODIFY the time zone and keyboard layout. Still, it
> is nice that they CAN do it, without extra screens :-)
>
> > However, restricting V8PT to use no TSRs, RAM or DISK Storage and
> > still run as little utilities to extend batch files, doing multiple
> things on the
> > same screen is not a viable option. I have thought of ways around this
> > problem. However, they either require some sort of storage or break
> > the vchoice, vecho… utility extension metaphor.
>
> To be honest, BAT is not a sufficiently powerful language
> to make user friendly menu systems. With some extra tools
> it is enough for the occasional "are you sure" pop-up etc.
>
> Cheers, Eric
>
> *such as having magic files specific to your distro version.
>
>
>
> --
> 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Oct 1, 2015, at 11:51 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi Jerome,
> 
> basically the "is the newest DOS already installed" check
> has to wait for the target selection. Plus it should not
> be necessary to use black magic* for this: I would prefer
> if the installer only checks if a DOS with LSM & package
> manager data structures is installed or not. Then other
> aspects of how new which package is can be handled by the
> package manager itself anyway.

What I have in mind for the test is extremely simple. Only test the
version of an C:\FDOS\VERSION.FDI file. This file could easily be
created at the end of the install. It would only cause the installer
to not automatically start when booting the install media. Running
the installer from the command line bypasses this test already. 
If the user uses advanced options to install to a different location,
deletes the file or runs setup.bat manually, the test fails causing the
installer to continue running. Basically, this test is only for normal 
users that do a default install and happen to either leave the media
inserted or are wishing to boot from the media for recovery options.

> 
> Regarding the partition check: I agree that automatic is
> too dangerous. This is exactly why I suggest that even a
> menu option to start FDISK or FORMAT should NOT be visible
> by default. It should ONLY be visible after making sure
> that the target disk does not contain any partitions yet.
> 
> In all other cases, I suggest to leave the installer and
> give the user full choice of what to do next - the user
> could start FDISK or FORMAT manually, or the user (which
> would be a better choice IMHO) could use GPARTED of Linux
> or the partition manager of Windows to non-destructively
> add a FAT32 partition for DOS without damaging others :-)

It doesn’t just run them. It asks if you would like to run them 
or exit the installer. 

Agreed there are some really nice partitioning tools out there. Many
the ship on LiveCD’s. 

> 
>> The Default "Quick and Friendly” version will NOT offer a list 
>> of drive targets. However, it may make it into the advanced mode
>> at some point.
> 
> You could make C:\FDOS the default and still make the field
> editable, to avoid having too many easy/advanced differences.

Only in the advanced installer. (once I have time to write the vask utility in 
V8PT)

From my understanding of what Jim wants, he wants (in basic mode) the user 
to experience as few questions and options as possible. So, if you have already 
partitioned and formatted a clean drive C:, then boot the installer (leaving it 
in basic
mode), you basically will get this:

Welcome to installer, continue?
Would you like a base or full install?
With or without sources?
Ready to install, continue?
Thank you. Were done,  reboot?

(I feel that in basic mode base/full + with/without sources should be one 
question with 4 options)

> 
> Cheers, Eric

:)

> 
> PS: Checking for already installed DOS is mostly to avoid
> boot loops when the user forgets to remove the CD after a
> DOS install and reboot and even then the user may want to
> re-run the installer if they have forgotten some packages.

PPS: That and for recovery because really messed up your config or autoexec.

> 
>> Let’s take the rare Multi-Boot scenario. Using Grub, Lilo or other boot 
>> loader:
>> 
>> BIOS drive 0x80, has windows ntfs and an extended linux, swap and fat 32 
>> partition.
>> BIOS drive 0x81, has freedos and extended fat 32 partition.
>> 
>> FreeDOS will assign the drives like this:
>> 
>> BIOS 0x80, ??, ??, ?? and D:
>> BIOS 0x81, C: and E:
>> 
>> Drive C: is on 0x81 and is perfectly fine. So, drive 0x81 partition 0 needs 
>> formatted for dos. But, this all goes away if you just ask DOS, hey is C: 
>> formatted.
> 
> Some kernel experts may want to comment on this :-)
> 
>> No target folder’s will be offered in the “Quick and Easy” version.
> 
> You would still have to tell the user what happens...
> 
>> The architecture of the new installer won’t care what scheme of
>> package management is used by the Release. 
> 
> Then you miss many advantages of our package managers.
> 
>> The “Quick and Easy” version will not offer types of backups or 
>> id it should overwrite the old files. It will simple move the
>> conflicting FDOS directory to FDOS.OLD. 
> 
> Acceptable, I guess...
> 
>> The “Advanced” mode will offer renaming, zipping or overwritten.
> 
> [and it]
> 
>> Provides more detailed options and a different color scheme.
> 
> As mentioned, I think you could keep everything in 1
> mode: The difference would only be that the user can
> decide whether to accept a default and hit the "next"
> button or rather "advancedly"  modify settings first.
> 
> As you already explain, advanced just means modifying
> more settings. I would prefer if all possible settings
> are always visible, but the user at the same time is
> informed that they can stick to the defaults often :-)
> 
> For 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Eric Auer]

Hi Jerome, thanks for your work on your installer :-)

> 1) boots from floppy or floppy image (like boot CD)
> 
> (Note: if user manually lauches installer, skip 2 and goto 3)
> 
> 2) Detects if latest FreeDOS version is installed (actual test not
> written) If it is the latest version, returns to prompt with welcome
> message. If not installer continues.

You have to skip this: After booting from the floppy or
CD, you always run the DOS from there, so the answer to
this question always is the same. Plus you say that you
skip step 2 if the installer is manually launched from
an existing DOS install.

> 3) Welcomes user to installer and asks if the want to continue. If
> no, returns to prompt with install aborted message.

I would ask that later...

> 4) Checks for drive C’s existence. If it exists, skip to 7.

If you booted the installer from USB, C: might be the USB.
It may be better to let the user select other targets here.

> 5) Informs user they need to partition and offers to run
> partitioner. if yes, runs fdisk. If no, returns to prompt
> with abort message.

Too dangerous. Only offer automatic partition / format after
making 100% sure that the main disk (BIOS drive 0x80) neither
has MBR nor GPT partitions at all yet. Otherwise, drop the
user to a prompt and suggest that they use tools in their
other operating systems to shrink existing partitions and
make a FAT32 partition for DOS. Tell them that, at the cost
of losing their existing data, they could also use DOS fdisk
and format for that.

> 6) Partitioner runs, then asked user to reboot. if yes, reboots
> if no, returns to prompt with abort message.  7) Checks if C is
> formatted. if yes, skip to 9.  8) offers to format or exit to
> prompt.

See above.

> ——— to do ———
> 
> 9) Offer backup.

Allow the user to select a target drive and directory, not
necessarily C: and FDOS (or FREEDOS?). Check if the target
exists. If no, make directory. If yes, check if it already
uses LSM to track installed packages. If yes, do smoother
upgrade by upgrading installed packages and adding those
which were not yet installed. If no, ask if old directory
should be just overwritten or moved away before backup. In
all cases, if user opts for backup, offer either renaming
or zipping of the directory, with file-name-anti-collider.

> 10) install.

Give a choice of BASE (explain that this is all that you
need for standard DOS and that you can always install more
packages with FDNPKG later) and FULL (explain that this is
100s of megabytes) install here :-)

> If user manually launches with "SETUP.BAT adv”, the installer
> will run in advanced mode.

To be specified what that does?

> Also, at any choice box, if the User presses CTRL-C, they are
> provided with choices to either quit to DOS, go back to where
> they were or switch to and from Advanced Mode.

On pressing CTRL-C, I expect to quit to DOS. I would not expect
this to be a magic trick to enter advanced mode. I do expect to
have the option to press ESC to go back from a choice situation.

Note that it would be nice to have choices grouped on screens,
at least I prefer to see what is coming to me instead of getting
one question at a time, never knowing what will happen next ;-)

Cheers, Eric


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Rugxulo]

Hi,

On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 9:44 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  wrote:
>
> Does anyone think the installer needs to support install from Multiple 
> Floppies only.

If it's easy to add, sure, go ahead.

> I could build it into the installer, but if only 0.01% would want it. I don’t 
> see wasting the effort.

Agreed, floppies aren't really well-supported anymore.

http://www.osnews.com/story/28868/Why_do_floppy_disks_still_exist_

Then again, keep in mind that some machines don't have optical drives,
and some don't boot from USB either. Floppies aren't great, but
they're better than nothing when nothing else is supported.

--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

"From" the flash drive.I burn the FreeDOS installation image to it,and it
boots.Again,as I said,it hits an error.Jerome said it was fixed in the new
installer.

On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 11:20 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr. 
wrote:

>
> > On Sep 30, 2015, at 2:04 PM, Rugxulo  wrote:
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 9:44 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr. 
> wrote:
> >>
> >> Does anyone think the installer needs to support install from Multiple
> Floppies only.
> >
> > If it's easy to add, sure, go ahead.
>
> Actually, it would probably be more of a pain for who would build the
> actual release than the installer.
>
> Even though this installer is batch file based, it is very flexible. (Not
> super fast though). With it’s new structure,
> it wouldn’t be hard for it to handle multi-floppies. But, building that
> release would be a little painful.
>
> >
> >> I could build it into the installer, but if only 0.01% would want it. I
> don’t see wasting the effort.
> >
> > Agreed, floppies aren't really well-supported anymore.
> >
> > http://www.osnews.com/story/28868/Why_do_floppy_disks_still_exist_
> >
> > Then again, keep in mind that some machines don't have optical drives,
> > and some don't boot from USB either. Floppies aren't great, but
> > they're better than nothing when nothing else is supported.
>
> Agreed. But, since the neither v1.0 or v1.1 ship with a multi-floppy
> install download I don’t really see a need for it.
>
> >
> >
> --
> > ___
> > Freedos-devel mailing list
> > Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
>
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 30, 2015, at 2:46 PM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU  
> wrote:
> 
> "From" the flash drive.I burn the FreeDOS installation image to it,and it 
> boots.Again,as I said,it hits an error.Jerome said it was fixed in the new 
> installer.

Should work with new one. As long as dos doesn’t think the flash drive is drive 
C:. 

> 
> On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 11:20 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  
> wrote:
> 
> > On Sep 30, 2015, at 2:04 PM, Rugxulo  wrote:
> >
> > Hi,
> >
> > On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 9:44 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  
> > wrote:
> >>
> >> Does anyone think the installer needs to support install from Multiple 
> >> Floppies only.
> >
> > If it's easy to add, sure, go ahead.
> 
> Actually, it would probably be more of a pain for who would build the actual 
> release than the installer.
> 
> Even though this installer is batch file based, it is very flexible. (Not 
> super fast though). With it’s new structure,
> it wouldn’t be hard for it to handle multi-floppies. But, building that 
> release would be a little painful.
> 
> >
> >> I could build it into the installer, but if only 0.01% would want it. I 
> >> don’t see wasting the effort.
> >
> > Agreed, floppies aren't really well-supported anymore.
> >
> > http://www.osnews.com/story/28868/Why_do_floppy_disks_still_exist_
> >
> > Then again, keep in mind that some machines don't have optical drives,
> > and some don't boot from USB either. Floppies aren't great, but
> > they're better than nothing when nothing else is supported.
> 
> Agreed. But, since the neither v1.0 or v1.1 ship with a multi-floppy install 
> download I don’t really see a need for it.
> 
> >
> > --
> > ___
> > Freedos-devel mailing list
> > Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 30, 2015, at 3:40 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
> 
> For option 2, all you would need to do is execute a FreeDOS version function 
> call. I don’t have the spec in front of me, however in the case of MS-DOS, 
> and INT 21H/3306H and INT 21/30 returns the DOS version number.
> 
> Int 21/30 can be altered by SETVER, but INT 21/3306 should return BL as the 
> major, BH as the minor. AL should be FFh if FreeDOS considers itself to be < 
> MS-DOS 5.0
> 
> You may want to (in the case of someone wishing to install  FreeDOS over 
> another DOS) use these functions I mentioned to determine the DOS that is 
> running, i.e., DRDOS, OpenDOS, MSDOS 7.x. I’ll leave that up to your 
> discretion.
> Hopefully that helps you out a bit. 
> 

Thanks for the reply. Unfortunately, in a couple cases that is not going to 
work.

 It would work fine if you had booted dos normally, then inserted the install 
media and run the setup.bat installer. (or run it from a subdirectory).

However, if you boot the install media and it runs the setup.bat file, the dos 
version will be the version you want to install. Not, the already installed 
version.

It will be easy to remedy though. After the installer completes, write a notice 
file like C:\FDOS\VERSION.FDI that is a text file containing the OS version 
information. Similar to what linux distros do.

Or, a less reliable method would be to query installed programs for their 
version numbers and figure it out from there. 

With the previous id file, at worst the user deletes it. Then if they boot from 
the install media, the installer will assume it is not installed and ask if they
want to do it again. 


> 
>> On Sep 30, 2015, at 10:32 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  wrote:
>> 
>> Did a little more restructuring. So now, the setup files make a little more 
>> sense now for future updates to the installer.
>> 
>> So far this is what happens:
>> 
>>  1) boots from floppy or floppy image (like bottle CD)
>> 
>>  (Note: if user manually lauches installer, skip 2 and goto 3)
>> 
>>  2) Detects if latest FreeDOS version is installed (actual test not 
>> written)
>>  If it is the latest version, returns to prompt with welcome 
>> message.
>>  If not installer continues.
>> 
>>  3) Welcomes user to installer and asks if the want to continue.
>>  If no, returns to prompt with install aborted message.
>> 
>>  4) Checks for drive C’s existence.
>>  If it exists, skip to 7.
>> 
>>  5) Informs user they need to partition and offers to run partitioner.
>>  if yes, runs fdisk.
>>  If no, returns to prompt with abort message.
>> 
>>  6) Partitioner runs, then asked user to reboot.
>>  if yes, reboots
>>  If no, returns to prompt with abort message.
>>  
>>  7) Checks if C is formatted.
>>  if yes, skip to 9.
>>  
>>  8) offers to format or exit to prompt.
>> 
>>  ——— to do ——— 
>> 
>>  9) Offer backup.
>> 
>>  10) install.
>> 
>> If user manually launches with "SETUP.BAT adv”, the installer will run in 
>> advanced mode.
>> 
>> Also, at any choice box, if the User presses CTRL-C, they are provided with 
>> choices to 
>> either quit to DOS, go back to where they were or switch to and from 
>> Advanced Mode.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Antony Gordon]

For option 2, all you would need to do is execute a FreeDOS version function 
call. I don’t have the spec in front of me, however in the case of MS-DOS, and 
INT 21H/3306H and INT 21/30 returns the DOS version number.

Int 21/30 can be altered by SETVER, but INT 21/3306 should return BL as the 
major, BH as the minor. AL should be FFh if FreeDOS considers itself to be < 
MS-DOS 5.0

You may want to (in the case of someone wishing to install  FreeDOS over 
another DOS) use these functions I mentioned to determine the DOS that is 
running, i.e., DRDOS, OpenDOS, MSDOS 7.x. I’ll leave that up to your discretion.
Hopefully that helps you out a bit. 


> On Sep 30, 2015, at 10:32 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  wrote:
> 
> Did a little more restructuring. So now, the setup files make a little more 
> sense now for future updates to the installer.
> 
> So far this is what happens:
> 
>   1) boots from floppy or floppy image (like bottle CD)
> 
>   (Note: if user manually lauches installer, skip 2 and goto 3)
> 
>   2) Detects if latest FreeDOS version is installed (actual test not 
> written)
>   If it is the latest version, returns to prompt with welcome 
> message.
>   If not installer continues.
> 
>   3) Welcomes user to installer and asks if the want to continue.
>   If no, returns to prompt with install aborted message.
> 
>   4) Checks for drive C’s existence.
>   If it exists, skip to 7.
> 
>   5) Informs user they need to partition and offers to run partitioner.
>   if yes, runs fdisk.
>   If no, returns to prompt with abort message.
> 
>   6) Partitioner runs, then asked user to reboot.
>   if yes, reboots
>   If no, returns to prompt with abort message.
>   
>   7) Checks if C is formatted.
>   if yes, skip to 9.
>   
>   8) offers to format or exit to prompt.
> 
>   ——— to do ——— 
> 
>   9) Offer backup.
> 
>   10) install.
> 
> If user manually launches with "SETUP.BAT adv”, the installer will run in 
> advanced mode.
> 
> Also, at any choice box, if the User presses CTRL-C, they are provided with 
> choices to 
> either quit to DOS, go back to where they were or switch to and from Advanced 
> Mode.
> 
> 
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Rugxulo]

Hi,

On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 1:46 PM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU
 wrote:
>
> "From" the flash drive.I burn the FreeDOS installation image to it,and it
> boots.Again,as I said,it hits an error.Jerome said it was fixed in the new
> installer.

I'm probably misunderstanding you. It's hard to debug things from
afar. My point is that, if you can already boot DOS via USB, just
install the full thing there and run that. Don't mess with the
physical hard drive at all. Don't install any further. Don't use the
jump drive as a stepping stone, just use it directly. Or is that
impossible for some reason?

--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Rugxulo]

Hi,

On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 2:40 PM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
>
> For option 2, all you would need to do is execute a FreeDOS version function 
> call.
> I don’t have the spec in front of me, however in the case of MS-DOS, and INT 
> 21H/3306H
> and INT 21/30 returns the DOS version number.

FYI, DR-DOS 7.03 needs to call int 21h, 4452h ("DR") else it pretends
to be IBM PC-DOS 6.00 (for compatibility). Not sure about the dozen
other DOSes.

--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 30, 2015, at 10:32 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  wrote:
> 
> Did a little more restructuring. So now, the setup files make a little more 
> sense now for future updates to the installer.
> 
> So far this is what happens:
> 
>   1) boots from floppy or floppy image (like bottle CD)

OOPS, Spell corrector did something weird there. should be (like boot CD).

> 
>   (Note: if user manually lauches installer, skip 2 and goto 3)
> 
>   2) Detects if latest FreeDOS version is installed (actual test not 
> written)
>   If it is the latest version, returns to prompt with welcome 
> message.
>   If not installer continues.
> 
>   3) Welcomes user to installer and asks if the want to continue.
>   If no, returns to prompt with install aborted message.
> 
>   4) Checks for drive C’s existence.
>   If it exists, skip to 7.
> 
>   5) Informs user they need to partition and offers to run partitioner.
>   if yes, runs fdisk.
>   If no, returns to prompt with abort message.
> 
>   6) Partitioner runs, then asked user to reboot.
>   if yes, reboots
>   If no, returns to prompt with abort message.
>   
>   7) Checks if C is formatted.
>   if yes, skip to 9.
>   
>   8) offers to format or exit to prompt.
> 
>   ——— to do ——— 
> 
>   9) Offer backup.
> 
>   10) install.
> 
> If user manually launches with "SETUP.BAT adv”, the installer will run in 
> advanced mode.
> 
> Also, at any choice box, if the User presses CTRL-C, they are provided with 
> choices to 
> either quit to DOS, go back to where they were or switch to and from Advanced 
> Mode.
> 
> 
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

At present the installer, SETUP.BAT should support installing from:

Boot from floppy/CD, with CD installer.

Install from any directory as long as V8Power Tools are present. 
(I’ll probably modify it, to adapt and use V8PT that will ship with the 
installer automatically.)

Does anyone think the installer needs to support install from Multiple Floppies 
only.

I could build it into the installer, but if only 0.01% would want it. I don’t 
see wasting the effort.
--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

I only use floppies to boot inoperable computers into DOS.I tried
installing FreeDOS from a flash drive,using RUFUS.Didn't work.Again,we
should add USB support so people could install the OS from flash drives and
such.

On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 10:44 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr. 
wrote:

> At present the installer, SETUP.BAT should support installing from:
>
> Boot from floppy/CD, with CD installer.
>
> Install from any directory as long as V8Power Tools are present.
> (I’ll probably modify it, to adapt and use V8PT that will ship
> with the installer automatically.)
>
> Does anyone think the installer needs to support install from Multiple
> Floppies only.
>
> I could build it into the installer, but if only 0.01% would want it. I
> don’t see wasting the effort.
>
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 30, 2015, at 12:39 PM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU  
> wrote:
> 
> To specify,it would boot into the INSTALLER,but the OS wouldn't install.It 
> would try to scan for the installation DVD,therefore hitting an infinite 
> choice loop.

That shouldn’t be a problem with the new installer. It really doesn’t care 
where you are installing from.

> 
> On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 12:37 PM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU 
>  wrote:
> I only use floppies to boot inoperable computers into DOS.I tried installing 
> FreeDOS from a flash drive,using RUFUS.Didn't work.Again,we should add USB 
> support so people could install the OS from flash drives and such.
> 
> On Wed, Sep 30, 2015 at 10:44 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  
> wrote:
> At present the installer, SETUP.BAT should support installing from:
> 
> Boot from floppy/CD, with CD installer.
> 
> Install from any directory as long as V8Power Tools are present.
> (I’ll probably modify it, to adapt and use V8PT that will ship with 
> the installer automatically.)
> 
> Does anyone think the installer needs to support install from Multiple 
> Floppies only.
> 
> I could build it into the installer, but if only 0.01% would want it. I don’t 
> see wasting the effort.
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

Nice.This will make it easier to modify the installer like a puzzle.

Now,for my other point.Should we support USB?I noticed that the older
installer doesn't support installing the OS to an external HD.

On Mon, Sep 28, 2015 at 8:20 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr. 
wrote:

> After discussing “Advanced” mode a little with Jim, I will be adding
> additional functionality into the FreeDOS 1.2 installer batch file.
>
> Starting of with a complete restructure of how it structured in the file
> system.
>
> Instead of a single do it all installer batch file, it will now be broken
> into smaller files. This will make it much easier for others to understand
> what part does what and for them to update and modify it in the future.
> The new version also supports theming and will choose between ether
> the basic theme or an advanced theme.
>
> At present, I am currently porting the previous work on the installer into
> the new version.
>
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

Well, before starting this major structural redesign of the FreeDOS Installer 
it was at about 50% complete.

At present, most of functionality has been ported over. (Except, the backup 
generator)

However, I figure it is now at approximately 30% complete. 

Please don’t confuse FDI’s progress with that of V8Power Tools. V8Power Tools 
is about 85% of the way to it’s version 1.0 release. But it already has 110% of 
what is needed to create the “Basic” mode installer for FreeDOS 1.2.
--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 28, 2015, at 12:32 PM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU  
> wrote:
> 
> Nice.This will make it easier to modify the installer like a puzzle.

:)

> 
> Now,for my other point.Should we support USB?I noticed that the older 
> installer doesn't support installing the OS to an external HD.

Well, at present. If FreeDOS sees the USB drive as drive C, it should be able 
to install there. The new installer does not really care
about the disk type of drive C. With a few exceptions, Drive C must not be 
flagged as remote or removable by the booted operating system (FreeDOS).

If you want to see if it passes those tests, download the latest V8Power tools 
from http://up.lod.bz/V8Power and run:

vinfo /v/dC

replacing C with A, B, X or whatever drives status you wish to find out about.
the message ‘Drive is ready” means it is flagged as a normal hard drive that is 
formatted.

> 
> On Mon, Sep 28, 2015 at 8:20 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  
> wrote:
> After discussing “Advanced” mode a little with Jim, I will be adding 
> additional functionality into the FreeDOS 1.2 installer batch file.
> 
> Starting of with a complete restructure of how it structured in the file 
> system.
> 
> Instead of a single do it all installer batch file, it will now be broken 
> into smaller files. This will make it much easier for others to understand
> what part does what and for them to update and modify it in the future. The 
> new version also supports theming and will choose between ether
> the basic theme or an advanced theme.
> 
> At present, I am currently porting the previous work on the installer into 
> the new version.
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 18, 2015, at 3:54 PM, Jim Hall  wrote:
> 
>>> On Sep 16, 2015, at 11:53 AM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
>>> 
>>> Hi,
>>> 
>>> I think the best solution would probably be two setup programs. A quick 
>>> setup like Jim wants and then a more advanced setup that provides all the 
>>> advanced tools, disk image creation that more technical users would want.
>>> 
>>> Simple version is the batch file, advanced version is C (or some other high 
>>> end language).
>> 
> 
> 
> On Wed, Sep 16, 2015 at 5:38 PM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr.  
> wrote:
>> 
>> Jim wants a super simple user friendly installer.
>> Jim gets a super simple user friendly installer.
>> 
>> However, after reading several of his posts on things like this. I think, 
>> that he would have no issue with someone creating
>> their own release that had a custom installer with as many options as anyone 
>> wants.
>> 
>> I do see many of the individuals here on the dev channel, REALLY, REALLY, 
>> REALLY want a lot options for the installer.
>> 
>> Unfortunately, this is not an Option. (Pun intended)
>> 
>> Maybe, all of you could convince him to do a "Developer” version of FreeDOS.
> 
> 
> I think we need to have a simple install process, so that everyone can
> install and use FreeDOS. Perhaps the simplest solution would be to
> relocate the existing C:\FDOS to C:\FDOS.001. (If C:\FDOS.001 already
> exists, increment to C:\FDOS.002 .. etc.) And rename the AUTOEXEC.BAT
> and CONFIG.SYS to AUTOEXEC.001 and CONFIG.001, etc. Your V8 Power
> Tools have the ability to do some math operations, so I guess this is
> possible?

Yep. (i need to add the zero padding bit. At present, it would just do FDOS.1, 
FDOS.2, ….)

I will make the zipped backup stuff an option for the power user mode.

> 
> For others who want to have a "Developer" or "Power user" version of
> the FreeDOS install process, I think that's fine. But I don't want it
> to interfere with the primary FreeDOS install process. Perhaps a
> solution would be to develop a separate "Power user" install BAT
> script .. anyone who wants to use this alternative could exit the
> primary FreeDOS install process, and run the "Power user" version from
> the command line.
> 

That will make a lot of these guys happier. :-)

Not difficult to make “Dev/Power user installer” inside the default installer 
with just using 
a command line switch to turn it on. Like "setup /adv” to. 

If they happen to exit the installer and go to restart it, it should keep the 
novice installer
from accidentally running the wron one. 

> Jim
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jim Hall]

On Fri, Sep 18, 2015 at 8:43 AM, Mercury Thirteen
 wrote:
> So we boot the live CD with a message to the effect of, "Welcome to the live
> environment! Type "install" to install FreeDOS on your system." and then the
> user can type install (or install /a or advanced mode) to go from there.
>
> Merc
>


I'm okay with this concept. I realize I am late in this discussion,
but we could have a "Power user" install BAT script. The
primary/default FreeDOS install process could mention that "Power
users" may want to use the alternative install process called
ADVANCED.BAT or SETUP.BAT or some other name that makes sense.

This would meet my goal of a simplified FreeDOS install process, and
meet the needs of those who want more control over the installation.
:-)

Jim

--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Eric Auer]

Hi Mateusz and Michael,

the installer should NOT try to be more clever or automatic
than we can SAFELY make that. I disagree with Mateusz about
the "simply give me a button to destroy my harddisk contents
and put DOS on it" because that is too destructive. Default
should be to ADD DOS to an existing FAT partition, if any.

Without checking or modifying whether that is the partition
which is flagged as boot partition, or alternatively adding
it to some existing boot manager which has config files on
some other partition anyway.

If no FAT partition is present, then you have two situations:

1. There is NOTHING at all, apart from maybe some MBR with an
empty partition table, on the main harddisk or SSD yet. Note
that we also have to check for GPT partitioning schemes here.

2. There is SOMETHING else on the disk already, but no FAT.

In case 1, it is okay for me - IF we can safely decide if the
target disk matches the case - to have a button saying "there
seems to be nothing on your disk yet, overwrite it with DOS?"

In case 2, the, hopefully experienced, user should be dropped
to a prompt. There, they can decide to reboot and use better
tools to make a FAT partition first. I certainly would pick a
tool like GPARTED in Linux or the built-in partition editor of
a modern Windows version at this point. OR the user can decide
to try their luck with DOS FDISK and FORMAT. By running those
manually and deliberately. But those two are FAR too destructive
to hit you over the head after you made a wrong choice in some
dialog from the installer about "what you want to do next"...



As we see from the recent question by Josefh, people often just
want to do something with DOS quickly. So a live CD mode, as far
as I am concerned installing BASE + optionally more to some big
RAMDISK, would be VERY nice to have for our installer CD.

They certainly do NOT expect to burn a FreeDOS CD, try to get
it to work by blindly pressing "OK" a few times and suddenly
realize that this has completely deleted their Windows & data.



I also agree that it would be very nice to have downloads with
pre-installed FreeDOS in some popular virtual machine container
format, as VM will be a popular way of installing a DOS today.
Mike gives a nice description of the reasoning behind this :-)



Regarding the package choice, I suggest a hierarchical menu:

1. One screen with one checkbox per category, with "BASE" as
the only checked checkbox per default. The user can optionally
check more boxes before hitting the "next" button. There can be

2. Buttons next to each category checkbox which say "select a
custom subset of packages" which bring you to additional menu
screens which do exactly that (although I doubt that lots of
users would actually take the effort).

Finally, the installer should make it very clear that for many
use cases, BASE already is all that you need and that FDNPKG is
a very convenient way to install and update those and other DOS
packages at any later moment.

Cheers, Eric



--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Eric Auer]

Hi!

> Disc boots:
> 
> Offers to install or quit.

What happens if you select "install"?

>  (note: if DOS is already installed, setup does no “launch”.
> The installer does this specifically for the disc to be used for recovery and 
> whatnot.
> What makes a better recovery disc than a live OS?)
> 
> if quit it sets up a live environment, should only take a couple of seconds.

You can make "quit" and "start live CD mode" separate items.
If the user just wants a minimal DOS, actually quitting the
boot process might be sufficient even without live setup...

> Then, if they wanted advanced mode. They can just relaunch the setup.bat /a. 
> 
> The live environment should not interfere with the installer.

IMHO the live environment can be a target for the installer,
to simplify things - same install process, but to RAMDISK. It
would of course skip the "SYS target" and "reboot" steps ;-)



To reply to a second mail:

> Also, what if the user has a partition which is utilized by another OS 
> but isn't crucial? (Linux swap comes to mind.) Yes, they can easily set 
> it back up again if they trash it with their FreeDOS installing, but in 
> a perfect world the installer would check the partition signatures to 
> see if they match up to anything important, even if there's no actual 
> files or filesystem.

Even if you only kill swap partitions, you break stuff. In the
best case, DOS gets deleted the next time that you use Linux.
In the worst case, Linux was hibernating on swap and you crash
the hibernated session. Plus on the next Linux boot, swap can
not be activated (assuming Linux does not automatically format
the swap area when it detects it being broken) and Linux could
run out of memory during the next boot...

In short, other partitions are never not crucial! Either there
is free space (unpartitioned space) or there is a FAT partition
or it has to be considered valuable. So in case 1, you may make
a FAT partition there. In case 2, you can ask the user if it is
okay to install DOS to that drive - probably showing the user a
directory listing to help them to decide. In case 3, you have to
abort the install process and let the user proceed only by hand.

Sub-cases: 1a there are no partitions at all - this is so simple
that automated partition creation is rather safe. 1b If there are
a few partitions already and some free space between them, it MAY
happen that operating systems get confused by adding a partition
as that could influence their drive letter numbering - thus WARN
the user or suggest to proceed by hand. 2a if there are no files
on the found partition yet, assume that the user made it for DOS
and be happy. 2b if there already are some files, warn user first.

Cheers, Eric



--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Mercury Thirteen]

Also, what if the user has a partition which is utilized by another OS 
but isn't crucial? (Linux swap comes to mind.) Yes, they can easily set 
it back up again if they trash it with their FreeDOS installing, but in 
a perfect world the installer would check the partition signatures to 
see if they match up to anything important, even if there's no actual 
files or filesystem.

On 9/18/2015 9:42 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr. wrote:
>> On Sep 18, 2015, at 4:08 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
>>
>>
>> Hi Mateusz and Michael,
>>
>> the installer should NOT try to be more clever or automatic
>> than we can SAFELY make that. I disagree with Mateusz about
>> the "simply give me a button to destroy my harddisk contents
>> and put DOS on it" because that is too destructive. Default
>> should be to ADD DOS to an existing FAT partition, if any.
>>
>> Without checking or modifying whether that is the partition
>> which is flagged as boot partition, or alternatively adding
>> it to some existing boot manager which has config files on
>> some other partition anyway.
>>
>> If no FAT partition is present, then you have two situations:
>>
>> 1. There is NOTHING at all, apart from maybe some MBR with an
>> empty partition table, on the main harddisk or SSD yet. Note
>> that we also have to check for GPT partitioning schemes here.
> I was coing t go that way with a special utility CheckHDD. But, realized
> it just wasn’t necessary.  (See Below)
>
>> 2. There is SOMETHING else on the disk already, but no FAT.
> Actually, we don’t need to do any of that. I super simplified the process
> in the installer already. Basically, this is what already happens in the
> current installer.
>
> You boot the install disk.
>
> The installer launches.
>
> If FreeDOS 1.2 is already installed,
>   Installer stops and returns the user to a prompt with a welcome message.
>
> If FreeDOS 1.2 was not found, or you manually launch the installer 
> (SETUP.BAT),
>   You are greeted by the installer, and asked if you wish to continue.
>
> The installer then check if FreeDOS can find a drive C: (regardless of it is 
> formatted)
>
> If it cannot find C:, then
>   The drive(s) are not partitioned, or
>   The drive(s) have no partitions that can be used for FreeDOS, or
>   The drive(s) are bad, or
>   The drive(s) are not installed.
>
>   We can only deal with the first two.
>   So, we offer to launch a partitioner or exit.
>
> Next, test if C: can be read by DOS.
>
> If C: was found but is unreadable, then
>   It is not formatted for DOS, or
>   It is corrupt, or
>   some other problem.
>
>   We offer to format the drive or quit.
>
> Next, it tests if any OS is already installed on C: by looking for specific 
> files.
>
> If it finds an OS, it offers to back it up or not.
>
> If the user wants to backup existing OS files, they are zipped up and stored
> in a sub-directory.
>
> —
> Waiting to hear from Jim on how he wants the installer to handle previous
> config and OS files. Keep and overwrite, or nuke em with clean stuff.
> --
>
> TO DO:
>   
> Offer option for the install: Base, Full, w/ or w/out sources.
>
> Possibly purge old OS and config files.
>
> Transfer System files.
>
> Install requested packages.
>
> Maybe install new config files.
>
> Offer reboot.
>
> :-)
>
>> In case 1, it is okay for me - IF we can safely decide if the
>> target disk matches the case - to have a button saying "there
>> seems to be nothing on your disk yet, overwrite it with DOS?”
> With the way things always keep changing, It is easy to
> foresee a situation that DOS thinks the drive is blank, but it is not
> empty and works fine if had been partitioned for dos elsewhere.
> We cannot assume, that just because we don’t see anything, that there
> is nothing there. (I’m not saying you would assume that)
>
>> In case 2, the, hopefully experienced, user should be dropped
>> to a prompt. There, they can decide to reboot and use better
>> tools to make a FAT partition first. I certainly would pick a
>> tool like GPARTED in Linux or the built-in partition editor of
>> a modern Windows version at this point. OR the user can decide
>> to try their luck with DOS FDISK and FORMAT. By running those
>> manually and deliberately. But those two are FAR too destructive
>> to hit you over the head after you made a wrong choice in some
>> dialog from the installer about "what you want to do next"...
>>
> Strongly agree with that. It is with installer offers to run a partitioner 
> and formatter,
> but DOES NOT just do it.
>
>> As we see from the recent question by Josefh, people often just
>> want to do something with DOS quickly. So a live CD mode, as far
>> as I am concerned installing BASE + optionally more to some big
>> RAMDISK, would be VERY nice to have for our installer CD.
> Up to Jim. :-)
> (But, it would be nice for power users.)
>
>> They certainly do NOT expect to burn a FreeDOS CD, try to get
>> it to work by 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 18, 2015, at 4:08 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi Mateusz and Michael,
> 
> the installer should NOT try to be more clever or automatic
> than we can SAFELY make that. I disagree with Mateusz about
> the "simply give me a button to destroy my harddisk contents
> and put DOS on it" because that is too destructive. Default
> should be to ADD DOS to an existing FAT partition, if any.
> 
> Without checking or modifying whether that is the partition
> which is flagged as boot partition, or alternatively adding
> it to some existing boot manager which has config files on
> some other partition anyway.
> 
> If no FAT partition is present, then you have two situations:
> 
> 1. There is NOTHING at all, apart from maybe some MBR with an
> empty partition table, on the main harddisk or SSD yet. Note
> that we also have to check for GPT partitioning schemes here.

I was coing t go that way with a special utility CheckHDD. But, realized
it just wasn’t necessary.  (See Below)

> 
> 2. There is SOMETHING else on the disk already, but no FAT.

Actually, we don’t need to do any of that. I super simplified the process
in the installer already. Basically, this is what already happens in the 
current installer.

You boot the install disk. 

The installer launches.

If FreeDOS 1.2 is already installed, 
Installer stops and returns the user to a prompt with a welcome message.

If FreeDOS 1.2 was not found, or you manually launch the installer (SETUP.BAT),
You are greeted by the installer, and asked if you wish to continue.

The installer then check if FreeDOS can find a drive C: (regardless of it is 
formatted)

If it cannot find C:, then
The drive(s) are not partitioned, or
The drive(s) have no partitions that can be used for FreeDOS, or
The drive(s) are bad, or
The drive(s) are not installed.

We can only deal with the first two.
So, we offer to launch a partitioner or exit.

Next, test if C: can be read by DOS.

If C: was found but is unreadable, then
It is not formatted for DOS, or
It is corrupt, or
some other problem.

We offer to format the drive or quit.

Next, it tests if any OS is already installed on C: by looking for specific 
files.

If it finds an OS, it offers to back it up or not.

If the user wants to backup existing OS files, they are zipped up and stored
in a sub-directory.

—
Waiting to hear from Jim on how he wants the installer to handle previous
config and OS files. Keep and overwrite, or nuke em with clean stuff.
--

TO DO: 

Offer option for the install: Base, Full, w/ or w/out sources. 

Possibly purge old OS and config files.

Transfer System files. 

Install requested packages. 

Maybe install new config files.

Offer reboot.

:-)

> 
> In case 1, it is okay for me - IF we can safely decide if the
> target disk matches the case - to have a button saying "there
> seems to be nothing on your disk yet, overwrite it with DOS?”

With the way things always keep changing, It is easy to 
foresee a situation that DOS thinks the drive is blank, but it is not
empty and works fine if had been partitioned for dos elsewhere.
We cannot assume, that just because we don’t see anything, that there
is nothing there. (I’m not saying you would assume that)

> 
> In case 2, the, hopefully experienced, user should be dropped
> to a prompt. There, they can decide to reboot and use better
> tools to make a FAT partition first. I certainly would pick a
> tool like GPARTED in Linux or the built-in partition editor of
> a modern Windows version at this point. OR the user can decide
> to try their luck with DOS FDISK and FORMAT. By running those
> manually and deliberately. But those two are FAR too destructive
> to hit you over the head after you made a wrong choice in some
> dialog from the installer about "what you want to do next"...
> 

Strongly agree with that. It is with installer offers to run a partitioner and 
formatter,
but DOES NOT just do it.

> 
> As we see from the recent question by Josefh, people often just
> want to do something with DOS quickly. So a live CD mode, as far
> as I am concerned installing BASE + optionally more to some big
> RAMDISK, would be VERY nice to have for our installer CD.

Up to Jim. :-)
(But, it would be nice for power users.)

> They certainly do NOT expect to burn a FreeDOS CD, try to get
> it to work by blindly pressing "OK" a few times and suddenly
> realize that this has completely deleted their Windows & data.
> 

That won’t happen with the installer. If, you just keep hitting return,
you will end up back at the prompt. :-)

But, there is nothing I can really do to prevent someone from trashing
their windows or linux install. 

> 
> I also agree that it would be very nice to have downloads with
> pre-installed FreeDOS in some popular virtual machine container
> format, as VM will be a popular way of installing a DOS today.
> Mike gives a 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 18, 2015, at 9:47 AM, Mercury Thirteen  wrote:
> 
> Also, what if the user has a partition which is utilized by another OS 
> but isn't crucial? (Linux swap comes to mind.) Yes, they can easily set 
> it back up again if they trash it with their FreeDOS installing, but in 
> a perfect world the installer would check the partition signatures to 
> see if they match up to anything important, even if there's no actual 
> files or filesystem.

Thats why we offer, but leave it up to the user. After all, if they have
EXT4, BtrFS, NTFS, HPFS+ and Xenix partitions scattered all over the
place, they probably have already setup a drive C: for FD to just install. Or,
at least, they should know better than to run fdisk,

:-)

> 
> On 9/18/2015 9:42 AM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr. wrote:
>>> On Sep 18, 2015, at 4:08 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Hi Mateusz and Michael,
>>> 
>>> the installer should NOT try to be more clever or automatic
>>> than we can SAFELY make that. I disagree with Mateusz about
>>> the "simply give me a button to destroy my harddisk contents
>>> and put DOS on it" because that is too destructive. Default
>>> should be to ADD DOS to an existing FAT partition, if any.
>>> 
>>> Without checking or modifying whether that is the partition
>>> which is flagged as boot partition, or alternatively adding
>>> it to some existing boot manager which has config files on
>>> some other partition anyway.
>>> 
>>> If no FAT partition is present, then you have two situations:
>>> 
>>> 1. There is NOTHING at all, apart from maybe some MBR with an
>>> empty partition table, on the main harddisk or SSD yet. Note
>>> that we also have to check for GPT partitioning schemes here.
>> I was coing t go that way with a special utility CheckHDD. But, realized
>> it just wasn’t necessary.  (See Below)
>> 
>>> 2. There is SOMETHING else on the disk already, but no FAT.
>> Actually, we don’t need to do any of that. I super simplified the process
>> in the installer already. Basically, this is what already happens in the
>> current installer.
>> 
>> You boot the install disk.
>> 
>> The installer launches.
>> 
>> If FreeDOS 1.2 is already installed,
>>  Installer stops and returns the user to a prompt with a welcome message.
>> 
>> If FreeDOS 1.2 was not found, or you manually launch the installer 
>> (SETUP.BAT),
>>  You are greeted by the installer, and asked if you wish to continue.
>> 
>> The installer then check if FreeDOS can find a drive C: (regardless of it is 
>> formatted)
>> 
>> If it cannot find C:, then
>>  The drive(s) are not partitioned, or
>>  The drive(s) have no partitions that can be used for FreeDOS, or
>>  The drive(s) are bad, or
>>  The drive(s) are not installed.
>> 
>>  We can only deal with the first two.
>>  So, we offer to launch a partitioner or exit.
>> 
>> Next, test if C: can be read by DOS.
>> 
>> If C: was found but is unreadable, then
>>  It is not formatted for DOS, or
>>  It is corrupt, or
>>  some other problem.
>> 
>>  We offer to format the drive or quit.
>> 
>> Next, it tests if any OS is already installed on C: by looking for specific 
>> files.
>> 
>> If it finds an OS, it offers to back it up or not.
>> 
>> If the user wants to backup existing OS files, they are zipped up and stored
>> in a sub-directory.
>> 
>> —
>> Waiting to hear from Jim on how he wants the installer to handle previous
>> config and OS files. Keep and overwrite, or nuke em with clean stuff.
>> --
>> 
>> TO DO:
>>  
>> Offer option for the install: Base, Full, w/ or w/out sources.
>> 
>> Possibly purge old OS and config files.
>> 
>> Transfer System files.
>> 
>> Install requested packages.
>> 
>> Maybe install new config files.
>> 
>> Offer reboot.
>> 
>> :-)
>> 
>>> In case 1, it is okay for me - IF we can safely decide if the
>>> target disk matches the case - to have a button saying "there
>>> seems to be nothing on your disk yet, overwrite it with DOS?”
>> With the way things always keep changing, It is easy to
>> foresee a situation that DOS thinks the drive is blank, but it is not
>> empty and works fine if had been partitioned for dos elsewhere.
>> We cannot assume, that just because we don’t see anything, that there
>> is nothing there. (I’m not saying you would assume that)
>> 
>>> In case 2, the, hopefully experienced, user should be dropped
>>> to a prompt. There, they can decide to reboot and use better
>>> tools to make a FAT partition first. I certainly would pick a
>>> tool like GPARTED in Linux or the built-in partition editor of
>>> a modern Windows version at this point. OR the user can decide
>>> to try their luck with DOS FDISK and FORMAT. By running those
>>> manually and deliberately. But those two are FAR too destructive
>>> to hit you over the head after you made a wrong choice in some
>>> dialog from the installer about "what you want to do next"...
>>> 
>> Strongly agree 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 18, 2015, at 9:43 AM, Mercury Thirteen  wrote:
> 
> So we boot the live CD with a message to the effect of, "Welcome to the live 
> environment! Type "install" to install FreeDOS on your system." and then the 
> user can type install (or install /a or advanced mode) to go from there.
> 
> Merc

Assuming Jim says ok to Live version. 

This is what I am thinking as the most User-Friendly way.

Disc boots:

Offers to install or quit.

 (note: if DOS is already installed, setup does no “launch”.
The installer does this specifically for the disc to be used for recovery and 
whatnot.
What makes a better recovery disc than a live OS?)

if quit it sets up a live environment, should only take a couple of seconds.

Then, if they wanted advanced mode. They can just relaunch the setup.bat /a. 

The live environment should not interfere with the installer. 


> 
> On 9/18/2015 4:08 AM, Eric Auer wrote:
>> Hi Mateusz and Michael,
>> 
>> the installer should NOT try to be more clever or automatic
>> than we can SAFELY make that. I disagree with Mateusz about
>> the "simply give me a button to destroy my harddisk contents
>> and put DOS on it" because that is too destructive. Default
>> should be to ADD DOS to an existing FAT partition, if any.
>> 
>> Without checking or modifying whether that is the partition
>> which is flagged as boot partition, or alternatively adding
>> it to some existing boot manager which has config files on
>> some other partition anyway.
>> 
>> If no FAT partition is present, then you have two situations:
>> 
>> 1. There is NOTHING at all, apart from maybe some MBR with an
>> empty partition table, on the main harddisk or SSD yet. Note
>> that we also have to check for GPT partitioning schemes here.
>> 
>> 2. There is SOMETHING else on the disk already, but no FAT.
>> 
>> In case 1, it is okay for me - IF we can safely decide if the
>> target disk matches the case - to have a button saying "there
>> seems to be nothing on your disk yet, overwrite it with DOS?"
>> 
>> In case 2, the, hopefully experienced, user should be dropped
>> to a prompt. There, they can decide to reboot and use better
>> tools to make a FAT partition first. I certainly would pick a
>> tool like GPARTED in Linux or the built-in partition editor of
>> a modern Windows version at this point. OR the user can decide
>> to try their luck with DOS FDISK and FORMAT. By running those
>> manually and deliberately. But those two are FAR too destructive
>> to hit you over the head after you made a wrong choice in some
>> dialog from the installer about "what you want to do next"...
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> As we see from the recent question by Josefh, people often just
>> want to do something with DOS quickly. So a live CD mode, as far
>> as I am concerned installing BASE + optionally more to some big
>> RAMDISK, would be VERY nice to have for our installer CD.
>> 
>> They certainly do NOT expect to burn a FreeDOS CD, try to get
>> it to work by blindly pressing "OK" a few times and suddenly
>> realize that this has completely deleted their Windows & data.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> I also agree that it would be very nice to have downloads with
>> pre-installed FreeDOS in some popular virtual machine container
>> format, as VM will be a popular way of installing a DOS today.
>> Mike gives a nice description of the reasoning behind this :-)
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Regarding the package choice, I suggest a hierarchical menu:
>> 
>> 1. One screen with one checkbox per category, with "BASE" as
>> the only checked checkbox per default. The user can optionally
>> check more boxes before hitting the "next" button. There can be
>> 
>> 2. Buttons next to each category checkbox which say "select a
>> custom subset of packages" which bring you to additional menu
>> screens which do exactly that (although I doubt that lots of
>> users would actually take the effort).
>> 
>> Finally, the installer should make it very clear that for many
>> use cases, BASE already is all that you need and that FDNPKG is
>> a very convenient way to install and update those and other DOS
>> packages at any later moment.
>> 
>> Cheers, Eric
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> 
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> --
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Maarten Vermeulen]

I think this is a late thing,  sorry for that.

Op 16 sep. 2015 11:17 schreef "Jerome Shidel" :
>
>
> On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen 
wrote:
>
>> Could we just give the user the option?
>
>
> I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if
he wants it to ask or not.

I have my own opinion of this. Because simple is not always better. In fact
it will be difficult to add things.
The user does also have its own opinion in what they want and do. That's
the same if you (in FDBASECD.iso) delete the xfdisk in FDBASECD you need
too install the boot manager by yourself there. If fdisk is away you
couldn't boot it. Maybe this is exaggerated. But it is the same with
choice. You can't get a installer without choice. Eventually you lose
people with that because they can't get it in our "street" then somewhere
else.

I make this point here. But it is true.

Maarten
--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

I agree with antony.Two installers,which can be downloaded,or something,to
setup FDOS 1.2.Some users need an advanced setup.Some users willjust use
the easy installer.So,perhaps two different installers would be a great
idea.I mean,I prefer advanced installations,so I have more power/control
over what does what.For example,when I installed FDOS 1.1,I only needed it
as a temporary OS (My harddrive formatted somehow,and I needed to wait
until I could find my old windows key).I only installed the base
packages,with a few GUI packages.

On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 6:52 AM, Maarten Vermeulen 
wrote:

> I think this is a late thing,  sorry for that.
>
> Op 16 sep. 2015 11:17 schreef "Jerome Shidel" :
> >
> >
> > On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen 
> wrote:
> >
> >> Could we just give the user the option?
> >
> >
> > I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if
> he wants it to ask or not.
>
> I have my own opinion of this. Because simple is not always better. In
> fact it will be difficult to add things.
> The user does also have its own opinion in what they want and do. That's
> the same if you (in FDBASECD.iso) delete the xfdisk in FDBASECD you need
> too install the boot manager by yourself there. If fdisk is away you
> couldn't boot it. Maybe this is exaggerated. But it is the same with
> choice. You can't get a installer without choice. Eventually you lose
> people with that because they can't get it in our "street" then somewhere
> else.
>
> I make this point here. But it is true.
>
> Maarten
>
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Mercury Thirteen]

There could be a secret (e.g. not listed anywhere on the installer 
screens) key or key combination (F8 or shift-F8 perhaps?) which plops 
the user into /Advanced Mode/ (put on sunglasses and rev engine here) 
which would allow all the extra choices, but wouldn't clutter the 
interface for average users. Thereby we can service both Jim's 
super-user-friendly wishes /and/ the power-hungry cravings of devs and 
power users.


Merc

On 9/17/2015 9:56 AM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU wrote:
I agree with antony.Two installers,which can be downloaded,or 
something,to setup FDOS 1.2.Some users need an advanced setup.Some 
users willjust use the easy installer.So,perhaps two different 
installers would be a great idea.I mean,I prefer advanced 
installations,so I have more power/control over what does what.For 
example,when I installed FDOS 1.1,I only needed it as a temporary OS 
(My harddrive formatted somehow,and I needed to wait until I could 
find my old windows key).I only installed the base packages,with a few 
GUI packages.


On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 6:52 AM, Maarten Vermeulen 
> wrote:


I think this is a late thing,  sorry for that.

Op 16 sep. 2015 11:17 schreef "Jerome Shidel" >:
>
>
> On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen
> wrote:
>
>> Could we just give the user the option?
>
>
> I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to
see if he wants it to ask or not.

I have my own opinion of this. Because simple is not always
better. In fact it will be difficult to add things.
The user does also have its own opinion in what they want and do.
That's the same if you (in FDBASECD.iso) delete the xfdisk in
FDBASECD you need too install the boot manager by yourself there.
If fdisk is away you couldn't boot it. Maybe this is exaggerated.
But it is the same with choice. You can't get a installer without
choice. Eventually you lose people with that because they can't
get it in our "street" then somewhere else.

I make this point here. But it is true.

Maarten



--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog
now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net

https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel




--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140


___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 17, 2015, at 2:45 PM, Mercury Thirteen  wrote:
> 
> There could be a secret (e.g. not listed anywhere on the installer screens) 
> key or key combination (F8 or shift-F8 perhaps?) which plops the user into 
> Advanced Mode (put on sunglasses and rev engine here) which would allow all 
> the extra choices, but wouldn't clutter the interface for average users. 
> Thereby we can service both Jim's super-user-friendly wishes and the 
> power-hungry cravings of devs and power users.
> 
> Merc

What would actually be easier to implement would be:

After boot, exit setup to FDOS prompt.
relaunch with setup /advanced.

> 
> On 9/17/2015 9:56 AM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU wrote:
>> I agree with antony.Two installers,which can be downloaded,or something,to 
>> setup FDOS 1.2.Some users need an advanced setup.Some users willjust use the 
>> easy installer.So,perhaps two different installers would be a great idea.I 
>> mean,I prefer advanced installations,so I have more power/control over what 
>> does what.For example,when I installed FDOS 1.1,I only needed it as a 
>> temporary OS (My harddrive formatted somehow,and I needed to wait until I 
>> could find my old windows key).I only installed the base packages,with a few 
>> GUI packages.
>> 
>> On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 6:52 AM, Maarten Vermeulen  
>> wrote:
>> I think this is a late thing,  sorry for that.
>> 
>> Op 16 sep. 2015 11:17 schreef "Jerome Shidel" :
>> >
>> >
>> > On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen  
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> >> Could we just give the user the option?
>> >
>> >
>> > I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if he 
>> > wants it to ask or not.
>> 
>> I have my own opinion of this. Because simple is not always better. In fact 
>> it will be difficult to add things.
>> The user does also have its own opinion in what they want and do. That's the 
>> same if you (in FDBASECD.iso) delete the xfdisk in FDBASECD you need too 
>> install the boot manager by yourself there. If fdisk is away you couldn't 
>> boot it. Maybe this is exaggerated. But it is the same with choice. You 
>> can't get a installer without choice. Eventually you lose people with that 
>> because they can't get it in our "street" then somewhere else.
>> 
>> I make this point here. But it is true.
>> 
>> Maarten
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> 
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>> 
>> 
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> 
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

Alright,because I haven't programmed anythig for the FD 1.2 distro yet,and
I'm on the development team.

On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 6:23 PM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr. 
wrote:

>
> > On Sep 17, 2015, at 5:45 PM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU <
> jcharbonnea...@cpsge.org> wrote:
> >
> > YES!PLEASE!I think we found ourselves a solution.
>
> Only, if Jim gives the OK.
>
> > Oh,and is there anything to be programmed?I haven't been ale to add
> anything yet…
>
> I can’t think of anything at present. But, keep your eyes and ears open.
>
> When the installer is done, it will only consist of about 10%-20%
> (completely made-up guesstimate)
> of the work needed for the next version of FreeDOS to be ready for release.
>
> >
> > On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 2:45 PM, Mercury Thirteen <
> mercury0x0...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > There could be a secret (e.g. not listed anywhere on the installer
> screens) key or key combination (F8 or shift-F8 perhaps?) which plops the
> user into Advanced Mode (put on sunglasses and rev engine here) which would
> allow all the extra choices, but wouldn't clutter the interface for average
> users. Thereby we can service both Jim's super-user-friendly wishes and the
> power-hungry cravings of devs and power users.
> >
> > Merc
> >
> >
> > On 9/17/2015 9:56 AM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU wrote:
> >> I agree with antony.Two installers,which can be downloaded,or
> something,to setup FDOS 1.2.Some users need an advanced setup.Some users
> willjust use the easy installer.So,perhaps two different installers would
> be a great idea.I mean,I prefer advanced installations,so I have more
> power/control over what does what.For example,when I installed FDOS 1.1,I
> only needed it as a temporary OS (My harddrive formatted somehow,and I
> needed to wait until I could find my old windows key).I only installed the
> base packages,with a few GUI packages.
> >>
> >> On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 6:52 AM, Maarten Vermeulen 
> wrote:
> >> I think this is a late thing,  sorry for that.
> >>
> >> Op 16 sep. 2015 11:17 schreef "Jerome Shidel" :
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen <
> mercury0x0...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> >
> >> >> Could we just give the user the option?
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see
> if he wants it to ask or not.
> >>
> >> I have my own opinion of this. Because simple is not always better. In
> fact it will be difficult to add things.
> >> The user does also have its own opinion in what they want and do.
> That's the same if you (in FDBASECD.iso) delete the xfdisk in FDBASECD you
> need too install the boot manager by yourself there. If fdisk is away you
> couldn't boot it. Maybe this is exaggerated. But it is the same with
> choice. You can't get a installer without choice. Eventually you lose
> people with that because they can't get it in our "street" then somewhere
> else.
> >>
> >> I make this point here. But it is true.
> >>
> >> Maarten
> >>
> >>
> >>
> --
> >> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> >> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> >> in one place.
> >> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> >> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> >> ___
> >> Freedos-devel mailing list
> >> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> >> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> --
> >> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> >> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> >> in one place.
> >> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> >>
> >> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> >>
> >>
> >> ___
> >> Freedos-devel mailing list
> >>
> >> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> >> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> >
> >
> >
> --
> > Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> > Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> > in one place.
> > SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> > http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> > ___
> > Freedos-devel mailing list
> > Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> >
> >
> >
> --
> > Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> > Get real-time metrics from all of your 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

YES!PLEASE!I think we found ourselves a solution.Oh,and is there anything
to be programmed?I haven't been ale to add anything yet...

On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 2:45 PM, Mercury Thirteen 
wrote:

> There could be a secret (e.g. not listed anywhere on the installer
> screens) key or key combination (F8 or shift-F8 perhaps?) which plops the
> user into *Advanced Mode* (put on sunglasses and rev engine here) which
> would allow all the extra choices, but wouldn't clutter the interface for
> average users. Thereby we can service both Jim's super-user-friendly wishes
> *and* the power-hungry cravings of devs and power users.
>
> Merc
>
>
> On 9/17/2015 9:56 AM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU wrote:
>
> I agree with antony.Two installers,which can be downloaded,or something,to
> setup FDOS 1.2.Some users need an advanced setup.Some users willjust use
> the easy installer.So,perhaps two different installers would be a great
> idea.I mean,I prefer advanced installations,so I have more power/control
> over what does what.For example,when I installed FDOS 1.1,I only needed it
> as a temporary OS (My harddrive formatted somehow,and I needed to wait
> until I could find my old windows key).I only installed the base
> packages,with a few GUI packages.
>
> On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 6:52 AM, Maarten Vermeulen < 
> netraa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> I think this is a late thing,  sorry for that.
>>
>> Op 16 sep. 2015 11:17 schreef "Jerome Shidel" :
>> >
>> >
>> > On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen <
>> mercury0x0...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> >> Could we just give the user the option?
>> >
>> >
>> > I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if
>> he wants it to ask or not.
>>
>> I have my own opinion of this. Because simple is not always better. In
>> fact it will be difficult to add things.
>> The user does also have its own opinion in what they want and do. That's
>> the same if you (in FDBASECD.iso) delete the xfdisk in FDBASECD you need
>> too install the boot manager by yourself there. If fdisk is away you
>> couldn't boot it. Maybe this is exaggerated. But it is the same with
>> choice. You can't get a installer without choice. Eventually you lose
>> people with that because they can't get it in our "street" then somewhere
>> else.
>>
>> I make this point here. But it is true.
>>
>> Maarten
>>
>>
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog 
> now!http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>
>
>
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing 
> listFreedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.nethttps://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
>
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 17, 2015, at 5:45 PM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU  
> wrote:
> 
> YES!PLEASE!I think we found ourselves a solution.

Only, if Jim gives the OK.

> Oh,and is there anything to be programmed?I haven't been ale to add anything 
> yet…

I can’t think of anything at present. But, keep your eyes and ears open.

When the installer is done, it will only consist of about 10%-20% (completely 
made-up guesstimate)
of the work needed for the next version of FreeDOS to be ready for release.

> 
> On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 2:45 PM, Mercury Thirteen  
> wrote:
> There could be a secret (e.g. not listed anywhere on the installer screens) 
> key or key combination (F8 or shift-F8 perhaps?) which plops the user into 
> Advanced Mode (put on sunglasses and rev engine here) which would allow all 
> the extra choices, but wouldn't clutter the interface for average users. 
> Thereby we can service both Jim's super-user-friendly wishes and the 
> power-hungry cravings of devs and power users.
> 
> Merc
> 
> 
> On 9/17/2015 9:56 AM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU wrote:
>> I agree with antony.Two installers,which can be downloaded,or something,to 
>> setup FDOS 1.2.Some users need an advanced setup.Some users willjust use the 
>> easy installer.So,perhaps two different installers would be a great idea.I 
>> mean,I prefer advanced installations,so I have more power/control over what 
>> does what.For example,when I installed FDOS 1.1,I only needed it as a 
>> temporary OS (My harddrive formatted somehow,and I needed to wait until I 
>> could find my old windows key).I only installed the base packages,with a few 
>> GUI packages.
>> 
>> On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 6:52 AM, Maarten Vermeulen  
>> wrote:
>> I think this is a late thing,  sorry for that.
>> 
>> Op 16 sep. 2015 11:17 schreef "Jerome Shidel" :
>> >
>> >
>> > On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen  
>> > wrote:
>> >
>> >> Could we just give the user the option?
>> >
>> >
>> > I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if he 
>> > wants it to ask or not.
>> 
>> I have my own opinion of this. Because simple is not always better. In fact 
>> it will be difficult to add things.
>> The user does also have its own opinion in what they want and do. That's the 
>> same if you (in FDBASECD.iso) delete the xfdisk in FDBASECD you need too 
>> install the boot manager by yourself there. If fdisk is away you couldn't 
>> boot it. Maybe this is exaggerated. But it is the same with choice. You 
>> can't get a installer without choice. Eventually you lose people with that 
>> because they can't get it in our "street" then somewhere else.
>> 
>> I make this point here. But it is true.
>> 
>> Maarten
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> 
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>> 
>> 
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> 
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> 
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> 
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Mercury Thirteen]

Perfect! A command line switch is efficient and effective.

On 9/17/2015 6:12 PM, Jerome E. Shidel Jr. wrote:
>> On Sep 17, 2015, at 2:45 PM, Mercury Thirteen  
>> wrote:
>>
>> There could be a secret (e.g. not listed anywhere on the installer screens) 
>> key or key combination (F8 or shift-F8 perhaps?) which plops the user into 
>> Advanced Mode (put on sunglasses and rev engine here) which would allow all 
>> the extra choices, but wouldn't clutter the interface for average users. 
>> Thereby we can service both Jim's super-user-friendly wishes and the 
>> power-hungry cravings of devs and power users.
>>
>> Merc
> What would actually be easier to implement would be:
>
> After boot, exit setup to FDOS prompt.
> relaunch with setup /advanced.
>
>> On 9/17/2015 9:56 AM, JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU wrote:
>>> I agree with antony.Two installers,which can be downloaded,or something,to 
>>> setup FDOS 1.2.Some users need an advanced setup.Some users willjust use 
>>> the easy installer.So,perhaps two different installers would be a great 
>>> idea.I mean,I prefer advanced installations,so I have more power/control 
>>> over what does what.For example,when I installed FDOS 1.1,I only needed it 
>>> as a temporary OS (My harddrive formatted somehow,and I needed to wait 
>>> until I could find my old windows key).I only installed the base 
>>> packages,with a few GUI packages.
>>>
>>> On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 6:52 AM, Maarten Vermeulen  
>>> wrote:
>>> I think this is a late thing,  sorry for that.
>>>
>>> Op 16 sep. 2015 11:17 schreef "Jerome Shidel" :

 On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen  
 wrote:

> Could we just give the user the option?

 I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if he 
 wants it to ask or not.
>>> I have my own opinion of this. Because simple is not always better. In fact 
>>> it will be difficult to add things.
>>> The user does also have its own opinion in what they want and do. That's 
>>> the same if you (in FDBASECD.iso) delete the xfdisk in FDBASECD you need 
>>> too install the boot manager by yourself there. If fdisk is away you 
>>> couldn't boot it. Maybe this is exaggerated. But it is the same with 
>>> choice. You can't get a installer without choice. Eventually you lose 
>>> people with that because they can't get it in our "street" then somewhere 
>>> else.
>>>
>>> I make this point here. But it is true.
>>>
>>> Maarten
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>>> in one place.
>>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>>> ___
>>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>>> in one place.
>>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>>>
>>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>>>
>>>
>>> ___
>>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>>>
>>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Mateusz Viste]

As far as I'm concerned, I agree with Jim on that one. Creating a 
super-power installer is pointless - it will take months to release (if 
it happens at all), while what I personally need is just an intro screen 
that warns me about all my disk going to be flushed, some 'OK' button so 
I give it a go, and 1 minute later I expect to have a shell on my 
freshly installed, minimalistic installation. When I want doing custom 
stuff, I do it it myself because I won't ever trust any automated tool 
to guess what I'm up to. In such case I'd need to be able to quit the 
installer and land on a floppy-based shell with sys, fdisk, format and 
ranish.

Shortly said, having a "perfect" installer would be nice, but here we 
are pointing at a cost-effective, realistic option that will still fit 
the majority of the user base.

Ultimately, the choice goes to Jerome of course, since whatever he will 
create, we will use as long as it works reasonably well (esp. since 
there is no other choice of installer).

Mateusz



On 18/09/2015 00:23, Michael Brutman wrote:
> I'm having a hard time trying to understand the requirement that the
> install should be super simple.
>
> At this point in time, anybody installing any version of DOS is probably
> not a novice.  An installer should give you a choice of things to
> install, broken down by groups and packages.  Usually there are ten to
> twenty high level groups to choose from, and then the individual
> packages are available.  It's not unreasonable to expect somebody
> installing an OS to do some work to select what they want to install.
>
> The case where we want to encourage people to kick the tires on FreeDOS
> is totally different.  If you want a novice to be able to run FreeDOS
> quickly then make a virtual machine image available to them.  VMWare,
> QEMU, and VirtualBox would cover almost everything.  People trying out
> FreeDOS in a virtual machine would expect to have everything installed
> and available, and they probably have large enough machines to make a
> full FreeDOS install look like a rounding error on the disk space.
>
>
> Mike
>


--
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome Shidel]

> On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen  wrote:
> 
> Could we just give the user the option?

I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if he 
wants it to ask or not.

But, I am really thinking purge the FDOS dir and install new config.sys and 
autoexec.bat is the best course.
> 
> Also, you could call the backup FDOS folder fdos.old a'la Windows and its 
> windows.old directory. At least that way some folks would know what it's for 
> when they see it again months down the road.
> 

At present, it wraps all that stuff up into a zip file. And puts it under a dir 
called FDBackup. Enumerating the zip as next avail FDBAK0.zip (or 1, 2, 3) 

Easy to change to FDOS.OLD though. 

>> On 9/15/2015 8:53 PM, Jerome Shidel wrote:
>> The installer is going well and is about 50% done. But, I have two questions.
>> 
>> Situation:
>> User is doing an upgrade install from FD1.1.
>> 
>> FDI already prompts to backup. Then will backup config files and the c:\FDOS 
>> directory.
>> 
>> 1) should FDI purge the c:\fdos directory before it installs the new files. 
>> Or, keep everything it doesn't overwrite?
>> 
>> 2) should the installer keep the users current config files or install new 
>> default ones. 
>> 
>> I see problems doing either of these, either way. 
>> 
>> The most reliable way would be to purge the c:\fdos directory and install 
>> fresh config.sys and autoexec.bat files. But, that will force the user to 
>> modify theirs post install. Not doing it, the system may be flakey or not 
>> even boot completely. 
>> 
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Antony Gordon]

Hi,

Unlike MS-DOS proper, FreeDOS comes with custom configuration files to
optimize for different things, I have my personal opinion on this, but I
digress. Given that the user may have modified the configuration files and
there is no easy way to merge the changes of a vanilla FreeDOS config to a
custom end user config, I would suggest maintaining the users configuration
files. If there is an issue, of course they can boot, use F5 and use a
support utility to replace their configuration files with the system
default (creating backups of course)

On Wed, Sep 16, 2015 at 5:16 AM, Jerome Shidel  wrote:

>
> On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen 
> wrote:
>
> Could we just give the user the option?
>
>
> I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if he
> wants it to ask or not.
>
> But, I am really thinking purge the FDOS dir and install new config.sys
> and autoexec.bat is the best course.
>
>
> Also, you could call the backup FDOS folder *fdos.old* a'la Windows and
> its *windows.old* directory. At least that way some folks would know what
> it's for when they see it again months down the road.
>
>
> At present, it wraps all that stuff up into a zip file. And puts it under
> a dir called FDBackup. Enumerating the zip as next avail FDBAK0.zip (or 1,
> 2, 3)
>
> Easy to change to FDOS.OLD though.
>
> On 9/15/2015 8:53 PM, Jerome Shidel wrote:
>
> The installer is going well and is about 50% done. But, I have two questions.
>
> Situation:
> User is doing an upgrade install from FD1.1.
>
> FDI already prompts to backup. Then will backup config files and the c:\FDOS 
> directory.
>
> 1) should FDI purge the c:\fdos directory before it installs the new files. 
> Or, keep everything it doesn't overwrite?
>
> 2) should the installer keep the users current config files or install new 
> default ones.
>
> I see problems doing either of these, either way.
>
> The most reliable way would be to purge the c:\fdos directory and install 
> fresh config.sys and autoexec.bat files. But, that will force the user to 
> modify theirs post install. Not doing it, the system may be flakey or not 
> even boot completely.
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog 
> now!http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing 
> listFreedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.nethttps://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Joe Forster/STA]

Hi guys,

Unlike MS-DOS proper, FreeDOS comes with custom configuration files to 
optimize for different things, I have my personal opinion on this, but 
I digress. Given that the user may have modified the configuration 
files and there is no easy way to merge the changes of a vanilla 
FreeDOS config to a custom end user config, I would suggest maintaining 
the users configuration files.


I agree; I'd really hate such a situation. Replacing configuration files 
should be an installation option, like "reset to default/factory 
settings". I'm not sure whether this option should be enabled or disabled 
by default; rather disabled.


Joe
--
KOVÁCS Balázs aka Joe Forster/STA; s...@c64.rulez.org; http://sta.c64.org
Don't E-mail spam, HTML or uncompressed files! More contacts on homepage--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU]

I prefer as many advanced options as possible.I keep a backup of my ENTIRE
network in FreeDOS (I'm funny like that,I guess.FreeDOS can't be affected
by windows viruses.).So if data were to be erased,I would have a mental
breakdown (In a sarcastic sense.).So,yeah.

On Wed, Sep 16, 2015 at 9:39 AM, Joe Forster/STA  wrote:

> Hi guys,
>
> Unlike MS-DOS proper, FreeDOS comes with custom configuration files to
>> optimize for different things, I have my personal opinion on this, but I
>> digress. Given that the user may have modified the configuration files and
>> there is no easy way to merge the changes of a vanilla FreeDOS config to a
>> custom end user config, I would suggest maintaining the users configuration
>> files.
>>
>
> I agree; I'd really hate such a situation. Replacing configuration files
> should be an installation option, like "reset to default/factory settings".
> I'm not sure whether this option should be enabled or disabled by default;
> rather disabled.
>
> Joe
> --
> KOVÁCS Balázs aka Joe Forster/STA; s...@c64.rulez.org; http://sta.c64.org
> Don't E-mail spam, HTML or uncompressed files! More contacts on homepage
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Antony Gordon]

Hi,

I think the best solution would probably be two setup programs. A quick
setup like Jim wants and then a more advanced setup that provides all the
advanced tools, disk image creation that more technical users would want.

Simple version is the batch file, advanced version is C (or some other high
end language).

-T

On Sep 16, 2015 11:26 AM, "JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU" 
wrote:

> I prefer as many advanced options as possible.I keep a backup of my ENTIRE
> network in FreeDOS (I'm funny like that,I guess.FreeDOS can't be affected
> by windows viruses.).So if data were to be erased,I would have a mental
> breakdown (In a sarcastic sense.).So,yeah.
>
> On Wed, Sep 16, 2015 at 9:39 AM, Joe Forster/STA 
> wrote:
>
>> Hi guys,
>>
>> Unlike MS-DOS proper, FreeDOS comes with custom configuration files to
>>> optimize for different things, I have my personal opinion on this, but I
>>> digress. Given that the user may have modified the configuration files and
>>> there is no easy way to merge the changes of a vanilla FreeDOS config to a
>>> custom end user config, I would suggest maintaining the users configuration
>>> files.
>>>
>>
>> I agree; I'd really hate such a situation. Replacing configuration files
>> should be an installation option, like "reset to default/factory settings".
>> I'm not sure whether this option should be enabled or disabled by default;
>> rather disabled.
>>
>> Joe
>> --
>> KOVÁCS Balázs aka Joe Forster/STA; s...@c64.rulez.org; http://sta.c64.org
>> Don't E-mail spam, HTML or uncompressed files! More contacts on homepage
>>
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
>
>
--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 16, 2015, at 10:38 AM, Eric Auer  wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi, plenty of interesting discussion points in this thread and in the
> metados thread (combining both topics as they are both about distros).
> 
> * I agree with Joe that DOS should not overwrite anything by default,
>   in particular not config files. I remember that old drivers would
>   for example prepend their lines to your existing config plus make
>   a backup. People may also have dual-boot. I personally think that
>   it is okay to make fdconfig.sys if config.sys already exists, but
>   put a comment line in the config.sys to let people know that their
>   config.sys is ignored by FreeDOS, which uses fdconfig.sys :-) And
>   if fdconfig.sys already exists as well, ask the user whether they
>   want to either KEEP their old config (copy template of new config
>   to same directory, so user can add some bits from there to theirs)
>   or REPLACE their config (rename their old config first), of course
>   with a default of keeping...
> 
> * However, I think there should be an option to throw the new files
>   over existing files in an existing FreeDOS dir. For extra complex
>   elegance, you could first UNinstall things with existing LSM data
>   instead of simple overwriting. The rationale in both cases is that
>   people tend to add their stuff to "our" DOS directory and it sucks
>   to have to dig up your 3 hand-installed tools from a "backup zip".
> 
> * for the same reason, there could be an option to just RENAME the
>   old DOS directory instead of moving the contents into a zip file,
>   as suggested by Mercury.

And if there is already an FDOS.OLD? :-)

Actually, I choose to wrap the old stuff up in a zip for a couple of reasons.

1st, nobody will roll back to the previous version.
2nd, the zip will use much less space until the user gets around to deleting it.
3rd, its much easier to remove 1 zip file than a bunch of directories and files.
4th, having a zip file looks nicer.
(I am just making these up. Basically, I just like the idea.) :-/

> 
> * Actually I think the whole idea of FDNPKG and similar is that you
>   can smoothly install tools, including automatic processing of the
>   case where you replace an old tool by a newer version of the same,
>   see the abovementioned "extra complex" suggestion.

Yeah, but FDNPKG requires 32-bit. I fairly sure Jim does not want
that restriction placed on his DOS distribution.

> 
> * I agree that LZMA UPX is going too far and has too high hardware
>   requirements. Use the open source version of UPX with --8086 mode.
> 
> * We should include a nice subset of EMS XMS UMB HMA managers, as it
>   depends on your hardware which are best. Our config can enable the
>   most popular driver and have commented out alternatives, to avoid
>   having unnecessary boot up menus. Disk space itself is no problem.
> 
> * I agree that metados should include all tool docs: I remember that
>   with my old Brezel distro, one additional floppy was enough to add
>   HTMLHELP and all the text files that come with all BASE components.
> 
> Cheers, Eric
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 


--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 16, 2015, at 7:58 AM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> Unlike MS-DOS proper, FreeDOS comes with custom configuration files to 
> optimize for different things, I have my personal opinion on this, but I 
> digress. Given that the user may have modified the configuration files and 
> there is no easy way to merge the changes of a vanilla FreeDOS config to a 
> custom end user config, I would suggest maintaining the users configuration 
> files. If there is an issue, of course they can boot, use F5 and use a 
> support utility to replace their configuration files with the system default 
> (creating backups of course)

Agreed. No matter if the installer is a batch or executable, trying to 
understand a custom user’s config and modifying it to suite the new version is 
more or less a futile cause.

So, that leaves two options. Leave the old one alone and hope for the best. Or, 
backup and replace with fresh config.


> On Wed, Sep 16, 2015 at 5:16 AM, Jerome Shidel  > wrote:
> 
> On Sep 15, 2015, at 9:27 PM, Mercury Thirteen  > wrote:
> 
>> Could we just give the user the option?
> 
> I could. But, Jim wants super simple. So, I guess I will have to see if he 
> wants it to ask or not.
> 
> But, I am really thinking purge the FDOS dir and install new config.sys and 
> autoexec.bat is the best course.
>> 
>> Also, you could call the backup FDOS folder fdos.old a'la Windows and its 
>> windows.old directory. At least that way some folks would know what it's for 
>> when they see it again months down the road.
>> 
> 
> At present, it wraps all that stuff up into a zip file. And puts it under a 
> dir called FDBackup. Enumerating the zip as next avail FDBAK0.zip (or 1, 2, 
> 3) 
> 
> Easy to change to FDOS.OLD though. 
> 
>> On 9/15/2015 8:53 PM, Jerome Shidel wrote:
>>> The installer is going well and is about 50% done. But, I have two 
>>> questions.
>>> 
>>> Situation:
>>> User is doing an upgrade install from FD1.1.
>>> 
>>> FDI already prompts to backup. Then will backup config files and the 
>>> c:\FDOS directory.
>>> 
>>> 1) should FDI purge the c:\fdos directory before it installs the new files. 
>>> Or, keep everything it doesn't overwrite?
>>> 
>>> 2) should the installer keep the users current config files or install new 
>>> default ones. 
>>> 
>>> I see problems doing either of these, either way. 
>>> 
>>> The most reliable way would be to purge the c:\fdos directory and install 
>>> fresh config.sys and autoexec.bat files. But, that will force the user to 
>>> modify theirs post install. Not doing it, the system may be flakey or not 
>>> even boot completely. 
>>> 
>>> --
>>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>>> in one place.
>>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140 
>>> 
>>> ___
>>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net 
>>> 
>>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel 
>>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
>> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
>> in one place.
>> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
>> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140 
>> ___
>> Freedos-devel mailing list
>> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net 
>> 
>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel 
>> 
> 
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140 
> 
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net 
> 
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel 
> 
> 
> 
> 

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Eric Auer]

Hi!

>> * for the same reason, there could be an option to just RENAME the
>>   old DOS directory instead of moving the contents into a zip file,
>>   as suggested by Mercury.
> 
> And if there is already an FDOS.OLD? :-)

As with your ZIP solution: In that case, rename to another name,
such as FDOS0042.OLD ;-)

> Actually, I choose to wrap the old stuff up in a zip for a couple of reasons.

Now we enter the realm of speculation and taste. In this case, mine...

> 1st, nobody will roll back to the previous version.

Apart from those who are upset by the install completely replacing
their old system directory. You cannot predict what users will like.

> 2nd, the zip will use much less space until the user gets around to deleting 
> it.

Not true IF you use the proper package management to UPGRADE the
old directory. Because then you do not need to backup that, as
only files belonging to known older FreeDOS tool versions would
be replaced by newer versions :-)

Also, it is important to know that FreeDOS binaries etc. often
are pre-compressed so they do not compress that much in a ZIP.

> 3rd, its much easier to remove 1 zip file than a bunch of directories and 
> files.

Your assumption is "nobody would like to see any of their older
files back again after upgrading" ;-) As experience with Windows
Vista, 7 and 8 shows, people do like XP nevertheless. Plus with
DOS, it is possible to combine old and new things... So do not
try to deprive users of their old files just because you are so
sure that "newer is better".

Comparing to the Linux situation: I do not normally make a copy,
zipped or not, of the complete old operating system to upgrade.

Instead, I trust the installer of the upgrade to replace all my
old versions of X by newer versions of X *and* giving me a way
to keep my old versions of Y in case no new Y is in the distro.

> 4th, having a zip file looks nicer.
> (I am just making these up. Basically, I just like the idea.) :-/

Hehe :-) In cases where upgrade is not possible (most common is
probably "you cannot upgrade because the old version is too old
to have proper bookkeeping of which files belong to which version
of which old FreeDOS tool" here) then I think renaming the FDOS
directory is a bit better than making a ZIP, but you could simply
offer both methods :-) In the "rename" case, the user can try to
move all old versions of Y to the new FDOS directory and may then
delete the renamed old version, or zip the remainder for a later
rollback backup. In the "zip" case, the user first has to unzip
the file before doing such things and may possibly re-zip later.



>> * Actually I think the whole idea of FDNPKG and similar is that you
>>   can smoothly install tools, including automatic processing of the
>>   case where you replace an old tool by a newer version of the same,
>>   see the abovementioned "extra complex" suggestion.
> 
> Yeah, but FDNPKG requires 32-bit. I fairly sure Jim does not want
> that restriction placed on his DOS distribution.

I disagree here: Basically installing from CD / DVD / USB already
requires that anyway. For older computers, installing by XCOPY of
some pre-installed-on-floppy distro is far more appropriate :-)

Also, there are lots of things that you want to do differently on
really ancient computers and I suggest to not bother making your
CD / USB based distro overly complicated by pretending that users
would be able to manage from USB stick on their PC-XT ;-)

Cheers, Eric

PS: Having a medium number of choices while installing is great for
me, as long as 1. the defaults are sane and 2. the install does not
pause too often to ask me stuff again. Better ask in a bundled way.



--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 16, 2015, at 11:53 AM, Antony Gordon  wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I think the best solution would probably be two setup programs. A quick setup 
> like Jim wants and then a more advanced setup that provides all the advanced 
> tools, disk image creation that more technical users would want.
> 
> Simple version is the batch file, advanced version is C (or some other high 
> end language).

Jim wants a super simple user friendly installer. 
Jim gets a super simple user friendly installer. 

However, after reading several of his posts on things like this. I think, that 
he would have no issue with someone creating
their own release that had a custom installer with as many options as anyone 
wants.

I do see many of the individuals here on the dev channel, REALLY, REALLY, 
REALLY want a lot options for the installer. 

Unfortunately, this is not an Option. (Pun intended)

Maybe, all of you could convince him to do a "Developer” version of FreeDOS. 

> 
> -T
> 
> On Sep 16, 2015 11:26 AM, "JAYDEN CHARBONNEAU"  
> wrote:
> I prefer as many advanced options as possible.I keep a backup of my ENTIRE 
> network in FreeDOS (I'm funny like that,I guess.FreeDOS can't be affected by 
> windows viruses.).So if data were to be erased,I would have a mental 
> breakdown (In a sarcastic sense.).So,yeah.
> 
> On Wed, Sep 16, 2015 at 9:39 AM, Joe Forster/STA  wrote:
> Hi guys,
> 
> Unlike MS-DOS proper, FreeDOS comes with custom configuration files to 
> optimize for different things, I have my personal opinion on this, but I 
> digress. Given that the user may have modified the configuration files and 
> there is no easy way to merge the changes of a vanilla FreeDOS config to a 
> custom end user config, I would suggest maintaining the users configuration 
> files.
> 
> I agree; I'd really hate such a situation. Replacing configuration files 
> should be an installation option, like "reset to default/factory settings". 
> I'm not sure whether this option should be enabled or disabled by default; 
> rather disabled.
> 
> Joe
> -- 
> KOVÁCS Balázs aka Joe Forster/STA; s...@c64.rulez.org; http://sta.c64.org
> Don't E-mail spam, HTML or uncompressed files! More contacts on homepage
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> 
> 
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
> ___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
> 
> --
> Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
> Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
> in one place.
> SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
> http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
> Freedos-devel mailing list
> Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

> On Sep 16, 2015, at 6:44 PM, Eric Auer  wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi!
> 
>>> * for the same reason, there could be an option to just RENAME the
>>>  old DOS directory instead of moving the contents into a zip file,
>>>  as suggested by Mercury.
>> 
>> And if there is already an FDOS.OLD? :-)
> 
> As with your ZIP solution: In that case, rename to another name,
> such as FDOS0042.OLD ;-)

That is way too easy. :-) 

Actually, the zip filename generator in the batch would not have in issue 
finding 
an unused FDOS.OLD directory. It already does this to insure that it 
doesn’t clobber a pre-existing zip file.

> 
>> Actually, I choose to wrap the old stuff up in a zip for a couple of reasons.
> 
> Now we enter the realm of speculation and taste. In this case, mine…

:-)

> 
>> 1st, nobody will roll back to the previous version.
> 
> Apart from those who are upset by the install completely replacing
> their old system directory. You cannot predict what users will like.

If you have to pick 1 of 3 choices, you’ll make 75% of people upset.
(1/4 are never happy)  :-)

> 
>> 2nd, the zip will use much less space until the user gets around to deleting 
>> it.
> 
> Not true IF you use the proper package management to UPGRADE the
> old directory. Because then you do not need to backup that, as
> only files belonging to known older FreeDOS tool versions would
> be replaced by newer versions :-)
> 
> Also, it is important to know that FreeDOS binaries etc. often
> are pre-compressed so they do not compress that much in a ZIP.
> 
>> 3rd, its much easier to remove 1 zip file than a bunch of directories and 
>> files.
> 
> Your assumption is "nobody would like to see any of their older
> files back again after upgrading" ;-) As experience with Windows
> Vista, 7 and 8 shows, people do like XP nevertheless. Plus with
> DOS, it is possible to combine old and new things... So do not
> try to deprive users of their old files just because you are so
> sure that "newer is better”.

(Joking:) Could just say “You better have made your own backup, because
we are going to NUKE and PAVE!” (Super user friendly) :-)

> 
> Comparing to the Linux situation: I do not normally make a copy,
> zipped or not, of the complete old operating system to upgrade.

For me, it’s basically start a new VM. 

> Instead, I trust the installer of the upgrade to replace all my
> old versions of X by newer versions of X *and* giving me a way
> to keep my old versions of Y in case no new Y is in the distro.

This is one of the reasons why I even brought this subject up. 
If the user really needs “Y” that is in their FDOS dir and it is not
part of the new version of FDOS, it will still be there.

This is actually one of the main reasons I went with the ZIP backup.
Make a backup, then over-write the old FDOS files. 

> 
>> 4th, having a zip file looks nicer.
>> (I am just making these up. Basically, I just like the idea.) :-/
> 
> Hehe :-) In cases where upgrade is not possible (most common is
> probably "you cannot upgrade because the old version is too old
> to have proper bookkeeping of which files belong to which version
> of which old FreeDOS tool" here) then I think renaming the FDOS
> directory is a bit better than making a ZIP, but you could simply
> offer both methods :-) In the "rename" case, the user can try to
> move all old versions of Y to the new FDOS directory and may then
> delete the renamed old version, or zip the remainder for a later
> rollback backup. In the "zip" case, the user first has to unzip
> the file before doing such things and may possibly re-zip later.
>>> * Actually I think the whole idea of FDNPKG and similar is that you
>>>  can smoothly install tools, including automatic processing of the
>>>  case where you replace an old tool by a newer version of the same,
>>>  see the abovementioned "extra complex" suggestion.
>> 
>> Yeah, but FDNPKG requires 32-bit. I fairly sure Jim does not want
>> that restriction placed on his DOS distribution.
> 
> I disagree here: Basically installing from CD / DVD / USB already
> requires that anyway. For older computers, installing by XCOPY of
> some pre-installed-on-floppy distro is far more appropriate :-)

Actually, with the way I am doing the installer, the source media will not
be an issue. It should be easily usable to install from Floppy, CD, DVD, 
FlashDrive ….. Multi-disc, or even boot floppy and install from CD. 
I might throw in support to install from a hard disk directory.

> Also, there are lots of things that you want to do differently on
> really ancient computers and I suggest to not bother making your
> CD / USB based distro overly complicated by pretending that users
> would be able to manage from USB stick on their PC-XT ;-)
> 
> Cheers, Eric
> 
> PS: Having a medium number of choices while installing is great for
> me, as long as 1. the defaults are sane and 2. the install does not
> pause too often to ask me stuff again. Better ask in a bundled way.

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Jerome E. Shidel Jr.]

BTW, thank you all for your comments on this topic. 

I do appreciate EACH and EVERY one of them.

Also, I hope I do not upset any of you with my slightly odd sense of humor. 

--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel

Re: [Freedos-devel] FDI 1.2 Questions?

[Mercury Thirteen]

Could we just give the user the option?

Also, you could call the backup FDOS folder /fdos.old/ a'la Windows and 
its /windows.old/ directory. At least that way some folks would know 
what it's for when they see it again months down the road.


On 9/15/2015 8:53 PM, Jerome Shidel wrote:

The installer is going well and is about 50% done. But, I have two questions.

Situation:
User is doing an upgrade install from FD1.1.

FDI already prompts to backup. Then will backup config files and the c:\FDOS 
directory.

1) should FDI purge the c:\fdos directory before it installs the new files. Or, 
keep everything it doesn't overwrite?

2) should the installer keep the users current config files or install new 
default ones.

I see problems doing either of these, either way.

The most reliable way would be to purge the c:\fdos directory and install fresh 
config.sys and autoexec.bat files. But, that will force the user to modify 
theirs post install. Not doing it, the system may be flakey or not even boot 
completely.

--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140
___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel


--
Monitor Your Dynamic Infrastructure at Any Scale With Datadog!
Get real-time metrics from all of your servers, apps and tools
in one place.
SourceForge users - Click here to start your Free Trial of Datadog now!
http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=241902991=/4140___
Freedos-devel mailing list
Freedos-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel