How to? exit TCC/Take Command to a new directory

[ed neff]

When TCC/Task Commander is started from a Windows CMD prompt (dos-window) using a BAT/CMD file is it possible to navigate away from the drive/directory where the BAT was started in and quit/exit/tccexit to the new drive/directory navigated to and be in the?
If so which product can accomplish task, Simplistically a "text window change directory command" with the ability to manipulate files. I had this in a 16bit version from 1986 and still use it over 200 times a day but it does not work under 64bit.

thank you

seconds and last question

can TCC make extend memory available to its environment?
for example
655360 bytes total conventional memory
655360 bytes available to MS-DOS
588304 largest executable program size

19922944 bytes total contiguous extended memory
0 bytes available contiguous extended memory
15580160 bytes available XMS memory
MS-DOS resident in High Memory Area

thank you for your time
ed class of '72

 

[vefatica]

I don't thoroughly understand your questions but ...

When you run MEM (as you apparently did) it runs in a "virtual DOS machine" ans so, has quite limited memory. TCC is a 32 or 64 bit app. It does not run inside a virtual DOS machine. It has quite a bit of memory available, as its built-in MEMORY command shows:

v:\> memory
 
            48 % Memory load
 
    2,144,985,088 bytes total physical RAM
    1,102,950,400 bytes available physical RAM
 
    4,292,468,736 bytes total page file
    3,213,574,144 bytes available page file
 
    2,147,352,576 bytes total virtual RAM
    1,942,179,840 bytes available virtual RAM
 
          262,144 characters total alias
          261,007 characters free
 
          131,072 characters total function
          131,071 characters free
 
          157,696 characters total history

In today's Windows, no program can change the current working directory of the program that started it.

 

[Charles Dye]

When TCC/Task Commander is started from a Windows CMD prompt (dos-window) using a BAT/CMD file is it possible to navigate away from the drive/directory where the BAT was started in and quit/exit/tccexit to the new drive/directory navigated to and be in the?

I'm not sure what you mean by "Task Commander", but you can certainly change directories in a batch file. See the CD and CDD commands. If you are finding yourself back in the original directory after the batch file ends, it may be because the batch file is inside a SETLOCAL/ENDLOCAL block -- which saves and restores, among other things, the current drive and directory. If you want to end a SETLOCAL block without restoring the original directory, use ENDLOCAL /D.

can TCC make extend memory available to its environment?
for example
655360 bytes total conventional memory
655360 bytes available to MS-DOS
588304 largest executable program size

19922944 bytes total contiguous extended memory
0 bytes available contiguous extended memory
15580160 bytes available XMS memory
MS-DOS resident in High Memory Area

All this jargon of conventional memory, expanded and extended memory, the High Memory Area, and so on is antique DOS terminology. It isn't relevant to a Windows-based program. TCC can use any memory Windows can provide, both actual memory and virtual memory.

 

[ed neff]

Thanks folks

I live in a DOS window full screen for most of my work. My editor uses Extended memory to edit large files so that is why I ask the question.
It needs "antique DOS" memory. The program I mention currently using over 200 times a day is a 16bit application now that's an antique. I started using PC when the Atari 400 was produced in the early 80s. My first version of DOS was 1.0, I have worked in IT since 1972. So yes I maybe an antique but I am far from unknowing. In fact it appears I can survive in the Modern World better then some can survive in the Antique world.

For what I do I out perform my peers that use an IDE to do all their work. So sometimes older is better. Just ask a Coke drinker how good New Coke was.

Charles, as Vince says, "In today's Windows, no program can change the current working directory of the program that started it.". He understood that I am trying to start TCC (I had thought I saw "TCC/ Take Command" written somewhere so I was under the mistaken impression that there were 2 flavors of Take Command. My error.) from a Windows Dos Window. I want to do that to take advantage of the flexibility of TCC to manipulate files and transverse drives and directories. When I arrive at a drive/directory I would like to exit TCC and be placed in the directory that TCC was in when exited. To that end Windows appears to be more ancient to me then Extended Memory.

Vince one way around the Windows limitation (and it is a limitation) is to have TCC edit an "exit" BAT/CMD file (or the BAT/CMD file that started TCC initially) with the Drive Letter and Directory set to what TCC was currently viewing. Now that written perhaps there is a TCC variable that can be used to pass that information back to the Bat file so it can change to the drive/directory desired. I think I saw a reference to a TCCEXIT command or something like that. Perhaps that is a place to start. I tried to understand the use./meaning of TCCEXIT but it alluded me.

Is there such a facility in TCC?

thank you

 

[ed neff]

sorry I see my error I called it TCC/Task Command not TCC/Take Command

 

[noahcoad]

Here's what I do:

Create a little runtcc.bat that looks something like this:
if exist c:\changedir.bat del c:\changedir.bat
c:\tools\tcmd\tcc.exe /c %1 %2 %3 %4
if exist c:\changedir.bat call c:\changedir.bat

Then when in TCC, for the directory you want to 'exit TCC from', put a line like this in your batch script:
echo cd c:\mydirectory > c:\changedir.bat

Then to run TCC, use runtcc.bat and it will change directory after exiting tcc.

 

[samintz]

Why do even need a "Windows CMD prompt (dos-window)"? Why not just run TCC/TCMD ?

What DOS-era editor are you still using? There are so many editors available today that blow the pants off the old text based editors like BRIEF.

 

[ed neff]

Why do even need a "Windows CMD prompt (dos-window)"? Why not just run TCC/TCMD ?

What DOS-era editor are you still using? There are so many editors available today that blow the pants off the old text based editors like BRIEF.

I guess you aren't a programmer. once you learn an editor you don't change for changes sake. the editor I use can handle files in the gigabytes and is flexible. I live in a Dos box because as I said I can outperform anyone else using the Microfocus IDE.

 

[ed neff]

Here's what I do:

Create a little runtcc.bat that looks something like this:
if exist c:\changedir.bat del c:\changedir.bat
c:\tools\tcmd\tcc.exe /c %1 %2 %3 %4
if exist c:\changedir.bat call c:\changedir.bat

Then when in TCC, for the directory you want to 'exit TCC from', put a line like this in your batch script:
echo cd c:\mydirectory > c:\changedir.bat

Then to run TCC, use runtcc.bat and it will change directory after exiting tcc.

thank you very much for you response I will give that a try

 

[samintz]

Ed, I am a programmer and have been for over 30 years. I am very familiar with all sorts of DOS editors from EDLIN, to WordStar, to BRIEF. Being able to edit in 50 line mode was an amazing thing back in the day. I have been forced to use "modern" editors just because our build environments require it. One of my least favorite of all time is Eclipse. Unfortunately, that's an environment that I have to use for our firmware development. My favorite GUI based editor is CodeWright. Unfortunately, Borland managed to kill it, so there are no recent updates. The IntelliSense capability of Visual Studio is actually quite good. VS is very good at locating a definition quickly. Almost all modern editors can be customized to a "standard" set of keystrokes. So if you are used to using vi or BRIEF, you can easily adapt.

In my GUI environment, I can easily see more than 50 lines and 120 columns and do much more than I ever could in a text-based editor.

But back to my original question to you, why do you need to run some things in TCC and everything else in CMD? Why not just use TCC?

 

[ed neff]

Ed, I am a programmer and have been for over 30 years. I am very familiar with all sorts of DOS editors from EDLIN, to WordStar, to BRIEF. Being able to edit in 50 line mode was an amazing thing back in the day. I have been forced to use "modern" editors just because our build environments require it. One of my least favorite of all time is Eclipse. Unfortunately, that's an environment that I have to use for our firmware development. My favorite GUI based editor is CodeWright. Unfortunately, Borland managed to kill it, so there are no recent updates. The IntelliSense capability of Visual Studio is actually quite good. VS is very good at locating a definition quickly. Almost all modern editors can be customized to a "standard" set of keystrokes. So if you are used to using vi or BRIEF, you can easily adapt.

In my GUI environment, I can easily see more than 50 lines and 120 columns and do much more than I ever could in a text-based editor.

But back to my original question to you, why do you need to run some things in TCC and everything else in CMD? Why not just use TCC?

I support Mainframe like Life/Annuity administration systems written in Cobol. 100s of thousands of lines of code
So I don't need to see more then 80 columns at a time
the editor I use is Kedit (no longer in production).
I use the Windows version for huge files as it lets me use all memory not just Extended memory so I can edit huge files
I have used the DOS version since 1986 and because of that have it tweaked to how I work
for example

• I can run a text search (I used to use Norton TS but for 64 bit I found a program called FR that works)
• the results of that search are piped to a text file
• when the search is done the text file gets opened in my editor
• I next deletes lines until I get to the files I want to look at /edit and hit a key combination and up pops the source code or the report file depending on what I searched through
• I can then edit the file or do what ever I want
• if I need to I have other key combinations that allow me to compare the file I am looking at to production or some other type of file
• I have a key combination that compares the current version of the source file to the last time I saved the file

using TCC I would

• be limited to the size of dos files I can exit with my editor
• I am not sure that the MicroFocus complier I use would be compatible with TCC
• I am not sure that the Administration system I use would be compatible
• also as the administration system sues a GUI front ed interaction there is another unknown
• for acceptance testing I take the code I have tested in a DOS version of the complier and have to recompile it using the current complier which is a full blown GUI IDE
• after 30 plus years developing this set of tools and procedures I can fly around the various things that are needed to be done

I am sure I could get used to that but being a consultant time is critical as you know

hopefully this explains why I do not want to leave the command line and use TCC exclusively
I have since found a bare bones program (Commander) similar to a lite version of TCC-Lite and the author was kind enough to make the change to allow me to drop into the current directory I am looking at