Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!ists!yunexus!maccs!cs4g6ag
From: cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca (Stephen M. Dunn)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Need input for future DOS release
Message-ID: <261106AB.2583@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca>
Date: 28 Mar 90 18:47:06 GMT
References: <26909@ut-emx.UUCP>
Reply-To: cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca (Stephen M. Dunn)
Organization: McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario
Lines: 31

In article <26909@ut-emx.UUCP> boerner@ut-emx.UUCP (Brendan B. Boerner) writes:
$2) A TSR Manager.  Programs written to use it would let it know what
$resources that they need (e.g. what interupts they would like to be
$activated on).  [...]

   This is a nice idea, but it's a bit late to retrofit DOS with a TSR
manager.  Think about how many TSRs there are out there - even if all
TSR makers switched to using this immediately, the number of older
TSRs would far outnumber those newer ones for years.

   Also, in order to use this, a TSR writer would either have to write
two different versions of his/her TSR (since obviously an old-style one
would be required for older DOS versions), or have a larger TSR that
auto-detects what DOS version you have.  Remember, there are still some
of people using DOS 2 out there, six years or so after DOS 3 came out,
and the same will apply for any newer DOS versions.

$6) A larger command line limit.  This would allow paths with length
$greater than 128 chars.

   This would be nice ... but it would be internal to DOS.  The command line
passed to programs is found in the PSP, which has been the same size since
day 1.  The only way around this would be to have DOS put the command line
in two places - one being the PSP, for backwards compatibility, and the
other being ... where?  It can't be static because then it would be over-
written if you shelled out from your program and ran something else.
-- 
               More half-baked ideas from the oven of:
****************************************************************************
Stephen M. Dunn                               cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca
     <std_disclaimer.h> = "\nI'm only an undergraduate ... for now!\n";