Date: Tue, 02 Dec 1997 10:16:19 +1300
From: physmsa AT cantua DOT canterbury DOT ac DOT nz (Mr M S Aitchison)
Subject: Re: COMP (was Re: OpenDOS 7.02b2 bugs)
To: opendos AT delorie DOT com
Message-id: <199712012116.KAA16082@cantua.canterbury.ac.nz>
Precedence: bulk

> @ CALL comp.com %1 %2 %3 %4 %5 %6 %7 %8 %9
 
Hey, this is neat!  Good thinking.

>      If I right understand, you not understand me - may be because
> you forget: "if errorlevel <n>" check return code for equal _or
> greater_ than <n>, so

I see what you mean - COMP in OpenDOS doesn't return an errorlevel
to help you decide if two files are the same... OS/2 has this nice
feature and I don't think it would cause incompatibilities to add
this to OpenDOS.

Which brings me to an important question:

Is there a current "wish list" that Caldera are taking notice of?

If so, could I add a request for the following minor enhancements...

1. COMMAND.COM should look at the first line of batch files and
   invoke a seperate program if the file begins with "#!" (as per
   Unix) to allow perl, etc scripts. Ditto for detecting Rexx
   scripts as per OS/2. This shouldn't increase the size of the
   program much, yet allow us to have identical script commands
   on multiple platforms.

2. COMMAND.COM should pre-process command lines by looking for "[!"
   and taking the rest of the line, up to the corresponding "]" as a
   command which is to be executed first, its standard output then
   inserted into the main command at that spot.  This is instead of the
   Unix syntax (e.g. dir `which comp`) and uses the syntax of Data
   General's AOS becaus eteh Unix synatx could be incompatible (it is
   unlikely people would alreadu use the two-character "[!" sequence)
   and because the method using "`" is confusing and cannot easily be
   nested).  Being able to do this, especially in a SET or IF is an
   amazingly powerful facility, and one which I most miss in DOS.

3. COMMAND.COM could interpret elements in the path having trailing "/"
   characters as meaning "this is possibly a Unix directory" to look for
   the command without extension as well as .com, .bat and /exe files (or
   provide an alternative way of enabling/disabling extensions in path
   searches). Ideally, I'd like to be able to enter something like:

 PATH C:\DOS;C:\UTES/;%NETDIR%;.;D:\BORLAND\*\BIN;E:\APPS.ZIP;\\fred\apps
  
4. Is MSDOS-style DIR/S on the "to do" list??  What I would like is for
   the internal DIR command to be used only when no command switches are
   given (for speed), in other cases it should call an external program
   (that we can replace/upgrade).  Making the internal commands too fancy
   is a problem for RAM footprint.  That philosophy could be applied to
   DEL, COPY, etc as well. 

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Mark Aitchison,                 \_   Phone: +64 3 364-2947 home 337-1225
Dept of Physics & Astronomy,    </     Fax: +64 3 364-2469  or  364-2999
University of Canterbury,      /)   E-mail: phys169 AT csc DOT canterbury DOT ac DOT nz
Christchurch, NEW ZEALAND.    (/'     www.phys.canterbury.ac.nz/~physmsa
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