Mail Archives: opendos/2003/09/29/11:59:34
> > Again, compatability can be maintained by having it switched off by
> > default, but that's no reason to dis-able it from being switched on when
> > desired.
>
> Again, it's not a matter of "switched off". It's a matter of the option
> *not existing*.
"switched off", "not exisitng" - whatever words you use, it's not
there (unlike most packages).
> > Compatability doesn't demand it be permanently disabled (only Bill
> > trying to get people to stop using DOS dictates things getting
> > permanently disabled - and in trying to get people away from MS,
> > DR-DOS should be as flexible as possible to enhance it's appeal).
>
> Again, you are *assuming* that the intended market is home use.
Where have I assumed that? I stated that DOS/Windows was part of the
push to get personal use of computers (which was demonstrably successful)
- that was 20 years ago. Today Bill Gates' intention is to get rid of DOS
altogether, and Lineo was pushing for the embedded systems market (I don't
know about the latest owners).
As I said, if you want to make as much money as possible, you have to
make your product as attractive as possible. Home use is PART of the
market, so the better it is for home use, the more money you're likely to
make. Personal use is cream on top of the business cake.
> True enough. But that's why my backup routines went
> like this:
>
> Backup to tape
> Verify backups
And sometimes backups become un-usable even after a successful
verification. People shouldn't have to rely on backups. They are just that
- a back-up, a back-up plan. Plan B. What you resort to when Plan A
doesn't work. That's why they're called "backups".
> The IBM PC was designed as an "under the table" project by some IBM
> engineers. When Visicalc got the Apple into businesses in a big way, IBM
> management started looking for a "personal computer" that could be sold
> to both buisiness and home, but they expected the real money to be
> business users.
My understanding is that IBM wanted to get into the growing personal
computer market (having only manufactured business machines before -
I.B.M., International Business Machines - mainframes and mid-ranges). They
might've wanted to sell it to business too, and maybe even get more money
from business, but the aim was still to get into the personal market. Get
some cream on top of the cake. Having a computer that could be sold to
both business and personal users is a change to what they'd done
before, which was only sell to business. IBM wanted a presence in the
personal computer market, and DOS/Windows was central to that project.
Whether it's a minor share or not, DOS was aimed at a market that
includes personal users (and should therefore be able to be programmed in
a suitable way).
> I just checked a DOS reference manual (that covered versions from 1.0 on
> up thru 3.3) and the *only* options for copy were /A, /B and /V.
MS-DOS (Win95) has prompting by default (I know, because I just checked
it by actually doing an xcopy), PINE has prompting by default, FTP has
prompting by default - DR-DOS is the ONLY tool I am currently using which
doesn't prompt for confirmation before overwrite.
> I checked the PC-DOS 4.01 and MS-DOS 5.01 manuals and had no luck
> either. The Novell DOS 6.0 manual lists /c as the switch for
> confirmation.
I am pretty sure that when I was using 6 point something, it was there
by default (but that was a while ago).
> And that does work in DR-DOS 7.03. I had missed it before because 4dos
> uses /C for "copy changed files only"
Aha! It's not showing up, so after all this arg... er, spirited
discussion, :-) the ultimate answer to my question is that the option DOES
exist (although it's not the default), but it's undocumented. Is there a
way to make it the default? I don't have any experience with undocumented
features (obviously I can't look it up if it's undocumented).
Thanks for finding that for me. I was going to try and see if I had any
disks still for 6.whatever, since I was sure it was there, but now you've
found it for me.
> Alas, since copy is built into command.com, you can't use the batch file
> dodge to "force" the /c.
I don't understand. Are you saying that "copy ... .... /c" in a batch
file won't work? Why not? Confused.
thanks,
dp.
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