Date: Tue, 11 Mar 1997 05:38:49 -0500 (EST)
From: "Mike A. Harris" <mharris AT blackwidow DOT saultc DOT on DOT ca>
Reply-To: "Mike A. Harris" <mharris AT blackwidow DOT saultc DOT on DOT ca>
To: "Colin W. Glenn" <cwg01 AT gnofn DOT org>
cc: "'OpenDOS newsgroup'" <opendos AT mail DOT tacoma DOT net>
Subject: Re: [opendos] That was interesting and unexpected
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On Mon, 10 Mar 1997, Colin W. Glenn wrote:

> On Mon, 10 Mar 1997, Roger Ivie wrote:
> > I pointed XDEL at a non-existent directory, like this:
> > 	C:\> XDEL /D/S BOOGER
> 
> syntax should be, XDEL \BOOGER /D/S, what you did was bad setup, you
> didn't specify a starting point so the system assumed you meant from the
> root.  If you had been in a subdirectory, it would of started from there.

In any command that I run in both DOS, *AND* in Linux, if a
source or a destination is to be a directory, I *ALWAYS* provide
a trailing directory separator (backslash in DOS, slash in
Linux).  That way, you immediately get an error message instead
of destroying your HDD.

Some examples:

C:\SOMEDIR\> MOVE *.* ..\NEWDIR

If NEWDIR doesn't exist, then all files are moved back a
directory one at a time and renamed "newdir" thus destroying all
files but the last one since they consecutively overwrite each
other.

Another example is PKUNZIPping a file without making the
directory first.  Fortunately, I've made a 4DOS alias that will
remove an accidentally unzipped, unrared, or self extacting EXE
archive that was installed into the wrong spot.  It requires a
bit of disk space, but it works like this:

1) Big dir with 90 files in it.
2) You accidentally extract an archive into this dir and end up
with 60 more files, not knowing which ones were in the archive.
3) My 4 line cryptic 4DOS alias called OOPS comes to the rescue
my simply typing:  C:\ARCHIVES\> OOPS <filename.ext>  Where
filename is the entire filename of the accidentally unarchived
archive.  OOPS chugs for a minute and removes the accident files,
leaving the directory as it was before the accident.  Reason for
programming:  A 4DOS dare.  

 

Mike A. Harris        |             http://blackwidow.saultc.on.ca/~mharris
Computer Consultant   |                  Coming soon: dynamic-IP-freedom...
My dynamic address: http://blackwidow.saultc.on.ca/~mharris/ip-address.html
mailto:mharris AT blackwidow DOT saultc DOT on DOT ca

4DOS is a very powerful COMMAND.COM replacement with over 80 commands!