Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!ames!pasteur!ucbvax!bloom-beacon!oberon!eve.usc.edu!mlinar From: mlinar@eve.usc.edu (Mitch Mlinar) Newsgroups: comp.os.cpm Subject: Re: The Highuser Option in ZCPR33 Message-ID: <8446@oberon.USC.EDU> Date: 15 Apr 88 03:40:00 GMT References: Sender: news@oberon.USC.EDU Reply-To: mlinar@eve.usc.edu (Mitch Mlinar) Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA Lines: 33 In article SAGE@LL.ARPA writes: > > The maximum user area displayed by SHOW.COM is not the highest one you >can log into but the highest one you are allowed to reference. SHOW does >display on one of its screens whether or not the Z33 command processor will >log into high user numbers. Z33 (and Z34) is the only command processor >that optionally allows user numbers above 15 to be logged into, and there is Wrong, Jay. QP/M (which you may not know about, although it has been around since 1983) has always offered 31 user areas. In fact, *all* of the programs associated with it (QSTAT, QPIP, CD, DIR, MAKE, etc.) know about 32 user areas. >considerable risk in doing so. I implemented that feature as an >intellectual challenge for experimenters who do not mind living on the edge. >I do not recommend logging into high user areas as a matter of course. > Here, I agree with Jay. I have found it *very* rare that anyone needs that many user areas. Clearly, you never would want it on a floppy (not enough storage to make it worthwhile). Furthermore, CP/M+ trashes files above user number 15 (it only looks at users 0 to 15 to make the allocation bit map) if given half a chance. On a hard drive, if you seem to be exceeding the limit, you should look at your hard drive setup. You might consider breaking your hard drive up into smaller logical drives which should give some breathing room. Although QP/M has always supported 31 user areas, most of the public programs which support du: have problems above user 15 (especially if they want to be compatible with CP/M+). I agree with Jay that it should be used with some care. -Mitch