Path: utzoo!censor!geac!maccs!cs4g6ag From: cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca (Stephen M. Dunn) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.programmer Subject: Re: How to find ANSI... Message-ID: <25E9ECF3.22016@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca> Date: 27 Feb 90 02:58:59 GMT References: Reply-To: cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca (Stephen M. Dunn) Organization: McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario Lines: 26 In article austin@bucsf.bu.edu (Austin H. Ziegler, III) writes: $ For a program which I'm writing, I want to provide ANSI, BIOS, and $DMA screen support. It is easy to determine whether I should use BIOS or $DMA, but I'm having problems detecting ANSI. If anyone can point me to how Well, I don't have a program, but here are a couple of ideas which will work: 1. Position the cursor to some known location using the BIOS, and then write some ANSI code and look at what's in that known location. If ANSI.SYS (or replacement) is present, it will be what was there before; otherwise, you should see the escape code you sent. 2. Clear the keyboard buffer and send the ANSI code that reports the status of the display, then see if anything appears in the keyboard buffer (also check to make sure it's what you expect so that you know ANSI put it there and that it wasn't the user typing something). Don't forget to clear the screen immediately afterwards if ANSI.SYS isn't present, or the user will wonder what that garbage that appears on the screen is there for! -- Stephen M. Dunn cs4g6ag@maccs.dcss.mcmaster.ca = "\nI'm only an undergraduate!!!\n"; **************************************************************************** I Think I'm Going Bald - Caress of Steel, Rush