caret or ampersand

[rayandrews]

Seems that whereas in 4DOS a caret was used to separate commands in a long alias, that's now done with the ampersand, is that right? If so, and if the answer isn't too complecated, I'm curious as to why the change. Also, since the ampersand had lots of uses before, I'm wondering if the above change has impacted any of the other uses of the ampersand.

Geez, I wish there was a 'moving from 4DOS to TCC' doc.
But that's what I get for being so far behind the times.

 

[Steve Fabian]

| Seems that whereas in 4DOS a caret was used to separate commands in
| a long alias, that's now done with the ampersand, is that right? If
| so, and if the answer isn't too complecated, I'm curious as to why
| the change. Also, since the ampersand had lots of uses before, I'm
| wondering if the above change has impacted any of the other uses of
| the ampersand.

Since COMMAND.COM did not have such a mechanism, when Microsoft followed in
JPsoft's footsteps in CMD.EXE, they used a different character for the same
purpose, to wit, the ampersand, hence when JPsoft introduced 4NT, it was
made the DEFAULT command separator. But JPsoft software is always more
flexible. There was already in 4DOS, and surviving to this day, a method to
specify your command separator symbolically ( %+ ) and two methods to change
the definition to any arbitrary character (instead of the default): the /C
option of the SETDOS command, and the CommandSep directive in the .INI file
(now preferrably set using the OPTION dialog). The first method (using %+)
allows you to write batch files and aliases that work on anyone's system,
regardless of their choice of command separator. The other two methods allow
you to make to select the same special characters you are already used from
4DOS, without the need to edit all your batch files. I as well as many other
TCC users continue to use the 4DOS defaults for ParameterChar and
EscapeChar, as well as for CommandSep.

|
| Geez, I wish there was a 'moving from 4DOS to TCC' doc.
| But that's what I get for being so far behind the times.

There was, in early versions of 4NT. Besides some DOS-only commands,
directives, environment functions and internal variables, which became
obsolete, the biggest issue is the different default mechanism for piping:
the standard pipe, specified by the vertical bar | symbol, the right side of
the pipe is performed in a separate instance of the command interpreter (if
you pipe the output of a pipe to another command, you'll have 3 concurrent
instances, etc.). Environment variables are inherited by the right side of a
pipe, but variables created or modified on the right side are not passed
back to the left. In the most recent versions there is a new symbol |! for
the 4DOS-style pipe, formally known as "in process pipe". That's about it!
--
HTH, Steve

 

[rayandrews]

| Seems that whereas in 4DOS a caret was used to separate commands in

Since COMMAND.COM did not have such a mechanism, when Microsoft followed in
JPsoft's footsteps in CMD.EXE, they used a different character for the same
purpose, to wit, the ampersand, hence when JPsoft introduced 4NT, it was
made the DEFAULT command separator. But JPsoft software is always more
flexible. There was already in 4DOS, and surviving to this day, a method to
specify your command separator symbolically ( %+ ) and two methods to change
the definition to any arbitrary character (instead of the default): the /C
option of the SETDOS command, and the CommandSep directive in the .INI file
(now preferrably set using the OPTION dialog). The first method (using %+)
allows you to write batch files and aliases that work on anyone's system,
regardless of their choice of command separator. The other two methods allow
you to make to select the same special characters you are already used from
4DOS, without the need to edit all your batch files. I as well as many other
TCC users continue to use the 4DOS defaults for ParameterChar and
EscapeChar, as well as for CommandSep.

HTH, Steve

Steve,

Thanks, yes. But I see that my Separator is now Escape, Parameter is now the Separator and Parameter itself no longer exists in my .BTMs.
I've seen how I can set it all back to my 4DOS defaults and that works fine but I could use some advice:

Am I better off reworking all my BTMs to use the modern defaults or should I reconfigure to use my 4DOS settings? The reason I ask is that whereas converting all my BTMs might be a lot of work, but it guarantees future compatibility and might save future headaches -- or is reconfiguring really no big deal and not likely to give me future trouble?
I have many very complecated BTMs that I use as a sort of VC system for programming and I want to start off on the right foot here.

 

[Jim Cook]

>
> Am I better off reworking all my BTMs to use the modern defaults or should
> I reconfigure to use my 4DOS settings? The reason I ask is that whereas
> converting all my BTMs might be a lot of work, but it guarantees future
> compatibility and might save future headaches -- or is reconfiguring

There are two reasons you might reconfigure to use the old 4DOS settings
that I can think of. 1) You are still using 4DOS and can't control the
configuration there. 2) The number of batch files, or unknown locations of
batch files, makes the conversion job prohibitive.

Unless you _really_ need to keep the old characters, I'd say to modify the
batch files. It also will give you any possibility of using a .BAT in both
cmd and tcc.


--
Jim Cook
2010 Sundays: 4/4, 6/6, 8/8, 10/10, 12/12 and 5/9, 9/5, 7/11, 11/7.
Next year they're Monday.

 

[Steve Fabian]

| There are two reasons you might reconfigure to use the old 4DOS
| settings that I can think of. 1) You are still using 4DOS and can't
| control the configuration there. 2) The number of batch files, or
| unknown locations of batch files, makes the conversion job
| prohibitive.

When I started to use 4nt and TCMD (16-bit), I was also using 4DOS, and
all my batch files were shared (and my aliases and my functions and even my
.INI files). Just setting the 4DOS defaults was trivial, and everything
(well, almost everything) worked "out of the box". I used TCMD back then
because it had implemented most of the X3.64 color escape sequences, a
feature added to 4NT much later.
I had also converted all my files to use the symbolic form of the
command line escape (%=) and the compound command separator (%+) so that I
only use the "regular" forms when I am in a hurry at the interactive command
prompt. I always wished that there were a symbolic form to represent the
ParameterChar as well, which would make my code completely independent of
what characters are used.
There are two issues that not converting cause.
1/ Most code in these fora use the TCC defaults without warning, you may
need to convert them before using;
2/ Rex chose the 4DOS command line escape character (ctrl-X) as the default
VariableExpand character (pressing this character while editing the command
line expands ALL variables AND variable functions to their current value). I
had to add the directives NormalKey=Ctrl-X" and "VariableExpand=ctrl-Y", in
that order, so that ctrl-X would have its 4DOS meaning, and I would have a
keystroke (ctrl-Y) available to expand command line variables.

| Unless you _really_ need to keep the old characters, I'd say to
| modify the batch files. It also will give you any possibility of
| using a .BAT in both cmd and tcc.

That last issue never came up for me. Since I bought my first copy to
4DOS I never used COMMAND.COM or CMD.EXE, although on rare occasion I do
utilize some of CMD's "external commands", i.e., MS command line utility
software. The two I use frequently are FC.EXE and SORT.EXE.
In conclusion: whether or not you "bite the bullet" of converting your
existing code (and your aliases, function definitions and batch files are
CODE) is something only you can decide.
--
Steve

 

[rayandrews]

| There are two reasons you might reconfigure to use the old 4DOS

| Unless you _really_ need to keep the old characters, I'd say to
| modify the batch files. It also will give you any possibility of
| using a .BAT in both cmd and tcc.

That last issue never came up for me. Since I bought my first copy to
4DOS I never used COMMAND.COM or CMD.EXE, although on rare occasion I do
utilize some of CMD's "external commands", i.e., MS command line utility
software. The two I use frequently are FC.EXE and SORT.EXE.
In conclusion: whether or not you "bite the bullet" of converting your
existing code (and your aliases, function definitions and batch files are
CODE) is something only you can decide.
--
Steve

Jim, Steve,

Tx. for feedback. Compatibility with CMD won't be an issue for me and I will be using 4DOS back and forth with TCC, thus I guess I'll keep the 4DOS characters, at least for now. I can always convert them to the modern characters once I get everything running smoothly, but there's so much to learn in the mean time, I'll bite that off later.

 

[jmcm]

On 19/05/2010 1:52 PM, Steve F����������������������������� wrote:

> back to the left. In the most recent versions there is a new symbol |! for
> the 4DOS-style pipe, formally known as "in process pipe". That's about it!

Wow! I missed that one. Thanks Steve and Ray for the discussion.


--
Regards
John McMahon
[email protected]