Now the sources of the COMMAND2.41 patch are out in the open, everyone can try the patch and probably someone might pick up the sources and try to add even more functionality. Interesting things are still to come

Ok, I know a bit about Grauw and his 'DOS3' project. Maybe this is the right thread for him to tell a bit more about that one as well.

and use the source as a basis for a new command interpreter maybe?

MSX-DOS 2.4x takes up quite a bit of extra TPA memory. If I recall correctly it's about 1kB in relation to MSX-DOS 2.20 and about 512 bytes compared to MSX-DOS 1.3.

Since MSX-DOS 2 already reserves 32kB for itself in the two highest mapper pages, I believe this used up memory can be returned to the TPA for use in user programs.

I also think Command2 2.4x uses quite much TPA. It should be able now to change the structure a little to increase free TPA.

DOS3 will be a multitasking OS, with a driver-structure. Direct I/O will not be allowed. DOS2 applications can be run in a 'DOS2 emulator' which basically just sets up the DOS3 environment in the same way as DOS2. DOS3 will be flexible enough for that. You don't have to be afraid of it becoming a difficult OS, you can use it in a similar way as DOS2 and program as if you're still working in a singletasking environment. Although sometimes allocating a device with no virtual devices-support might fail because another program is already using it. But alas, there's no helping to that just do a little proper error handling.

As for the relation between COMMAND2.COM v2.41, it is a DOS2 application just like any other and doesn't perform any direct I/O (at least v2.31 doesn't), so it can run in DOS3 just like any other application. As a matter of fact, until I write DOS3's own shell (COMMAND3.COM ;p) I plan to use the DOS2 one. The DOS3 shell *will* be a little different from the DOS2 one, it will have more Windows NT-like behaviour (so DEL * will delete all files and not only the ones without extension), and I actually plan to remove the difference between files and directories as far as moving them etc. is concerned, although I'm not really sure about that yet.

Oh, and with all this talk about DOS3, er, at the moment I am not actively working on it because there is some other project demanding my attention, so don't start expecting it in the near future or anything.

~Grauw

Quote:

MSX-DOS 2.4x takes up quite a bit of extra TPA memory. If I recall correctly it's about 1kB in relation to MSX-DOS 2.20 and about 512 bytes compared to MSX-DOS 1.3. Since MSX-DOS 2 already reserves 32kB for itself in the two highest mapper pages, I believe this used up memory can be returned to the TPA for use in user programs.

I know this, but why amount of TPA is so important? If I have understanded correctly MSXDOS2.SYS will load COMMAND2.COM again, if the same TPA space is used. I know, that this might be fustrating for floppy users, but I don't believe that there are too many floppy users that are interested about DOS2.4x anyway.

Have I missed something important?

I have already did some research on DOS 2.41 code and I found out, that some space could be saved by adding FAT16 support (Yes, the new code is smaller ) and removing not documented %NEWFILE[]% function.

Anyway there are also things that need to be added... Fix to ALIAS command will add one byte... I have also always wanted %PEEK[]% function, so that has to be added. DIR /S (sub dirs) would be nice and so on...

I would also like to hear, if you have noticed any bugs, that needs to be corrected?

Well, for instance, MSP (a midi player with a graphical analyzer) needs quite some TPA to work. It doesn't run on my turboR in DOS 2.41 :/

Hmm... Maybe I have then missed something... I always thought, that TPA space used by COMMAND2.COM is available for aplications, when they are loaded...

(Any informative links for me to read?)

~NYYRIKKI

Every COMMAND2.COM installs part of itself in the top of TPA. Version 2.4x of COMMAND2.COM is just too big (thus installing a bit too much in the top of TPA and making it a bit too small for some programs to work :/

Maybe an option to free TPA memory by disabling extended features would come in handy

I was more thinking in the direction of moving the extra stuff to another place in memory, possibly sacrifising a bit of memory for either history or aliases. I don't think aliases and history don't need that full 16 KB it uses now.