Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!mitel!sce!ulysses!garym
From: garym@ulysses.UUCP (Gary Murphy)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Anybody used 4DOS version 2.21
Message-ID: <7362@ulysses.UUCP>
Date: 31 Oct 89 17:36:23 GMT
References: <5706@shlump.nac.dec.com> <933@sdrc.UUCP>
Reply-To: garym@cognos.UUCP (Gary Murphy)
Organization: Cognos Inc., Ottawa, Canada
Lines: 41

In article <5706@shlump.nac.dec.com>, wales@gidday.enet.dec.com (David Wales) writes:
> G'Day,
> 
> 	I recently downloaded 4DOS version 2.21 from a bulletin board and have
> installed it on my PC's at work and home.  It looks to be a VERY good product
> so far with many enhancements over command.com.  Has anybody else used it adn
> if so have you found any problems with it?  I am running it on 286 systems
> under MS-DOS 3.3.  Also, is version 2.21 the latest?  It is so far in > > 
> Australia but we can be a bit slow in the update department sometimes.
>

I tried 4DOS and was much impressed, for about a week ...

This is not to detract from a fine product that will probably suit
most users, it's just that where it failed started to get bothersome.

The first to find a bug (which is documented) was my 4-year old who
tried to run PC-PaintBrush.  Since APPEND is not allowed, and since this
program doesn't support any sort of environment settings, I could no
longer have PC-PaintBrush load itself in her directory, and there is no
way a 4 year old is going to click through directory after directory
trying to find her name.  A minor point, but important if you depend on
append to overcome other brain-dead software.

My brother found the second bug (undocumented) when he tried to load
a pop-up utility to get on-line help (QHELP).  The TSR would not load, and
further testing found a number of TSR's which did not load.

I _liked_ 4DOS and really enjoyed it where it worked.  From a features
point of view, the only shortcoming compared to ANARKEY (which sometimes
just stops working) is the lack of file/directory name completion.  I'm
on the lookout for the next versions in hopes of better compatibility with
TSRs, and in the meantime, I'm keeping my backups of my 4DOS CONFIG and
Autoexec files at the ready.


-- 
Gary Murphy                   decvax!utzoo!dciem!nrcaer!cognos!garym
                              (garym%cognos.uucp@uunet.uu.net)
(613) 738-1338 x5537          Cognos Inc. P.O. Box 9707 Ottawa K1G 3N3
"There are many things which do not concern the process" - Joan of Arc