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From: kneller@ucsfcgl.UUCP (Don Kneller%Langridge)
Newsgroups: net.micro.pc
Subject: Re: switchar
Message-ID: <9950@cgl.ucsf.edu.ucsfcgl.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 29-Oct-86 20:11:28 EST
Article-I.D.: cgl.9950
Posted: Wed Oct 29 20:11:28 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 30-Oct-86 06:32:09 EST
References: <1402@uw-june> <145@netxcom.UUCP>
Reply-To: kneller@cgl.ucsf.edu.UUCP (Don Kneller)
Organization: Computer Graphics Laboratory, UCSF
Lines: 21

In article <145@netxcom.UUCP> jallen@netxcom.UUCP (John Allen) writes:
>In article <1402@uw-june> roper@uw-june.UUCP writes:
>>What is "switchar"?  I have stumbled across a couple of cryptic
>>references to it and my curiosity is piqued.
>
>The switch character,
>as the name implies, is used to delineate command line switches.  The
>default character is '/' under DOS.  I like to use '-' instead, since
>I'm likely to type that without thinking about it.  Every DOS command,
>Microsoft C, and many others seem to use the undocumented call to read
>the switch character, or atleast accept the '-' that I like to use.

Be careful though.  LINK and LIB don't use switchar, relying on / only.
Also, when switchar is -, for COMMAND.COM you *must* give the path to
executable files with /; \ won't work anymore.  Eg. \bin\cl is now /bin/cl.
The above applies for DOS 3.1
-- 
	Don Kneller
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