Date: Fri, 19 Sep 1997 18:20:55 -0600 (MDT)
Message-Id: <199709200020.SAA23004@kewlaid.highfiber.com>
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To: opendos AT delorie DOT com
From: raster AT highfiber DOT com (Charles Dye)
Subject: OpenDOS observations
Precedence: bulk


First, I think I've found a brand-new bug in the 7.02 COMMAND.COM.
IF EXIST FOO DEL FOO bombs in a batch file if FOO exists.  Seems to work
correctly from the command line.  Can anyone else replicate this error?

Second, I believe that the way OpenDOS handles a clean boot (F5 at the
"Starting DOS" prompt) could be improved.  The 7.02 release correctly
skips over CONFIG.SYS, then goes ahead and processes AUTOEXEC.BAT anyway.
(This appears to be a Novell-brand bug, not a Caldera-brand bug.)

On a clean boot, the default path is set to \OPENDOS if it exists.  Users
who upgrade from Novell DOS or DR-DOS will have to set the path by hand,
since COMMAND.COM does not check for the existence of \NWDOS or \DRDOS.
Ditto those of us who prefer the shorter, more generic \DOS.  It's not
difficult to patch COMMAND.COM to fix the default path.  But I think it
would be more elegant if the shell automatically scanned for appropriate
directories.  (MS- and IBM DOS, by comparison, check for both \MSDOS and
\DOS directories.)

Finally, on a clean boot, OpenDOS assumes that the correct command shell
must be in the root directory.  At the moment, this makes for a neat
workaround for the AUTOEXEC.BAT bug:  put COMMAND.COM 7.02 in the DOS
directory and set SHELL= appropriately; keep COMMAND.COM 7.01 in the root,
so AUTOEXEC.BAT won't be executed on a clean boot.  However, I'd like to
see OpenDOS look for the shell in appropriate DOS directories as well,
like MS- and IBM DOS do.  I'm cranky about junk in the root.

<Closing eyes and clicking heels together three times>  How about FAT32
support?

raster AT highfiber DOT com