VDE under vDOS

[dmccunney]

Running VDE under vDOS is mentioned elsewhere. As mentioned, you put
VDE in a directory, with customized versions of the vDOS autoexec.txt
and config.txt files, and run vDOS from a shortcut that starts in the
VDE directory. It read the files and runs VDE in the vDOS
environment.

My config files look like this:

CONFIG.TXT

REM Configuration
rem EMS = ON
LOW = ON
REM You can use a Truetype font in vDOS. I use Lucida console. (Copy
the TTF File into the DOS program directory.)
FONT = LUCON
REM Specify whether vDOS shows a border on the window. Default is off.
FRAME = ON
REM Specify percent of screen the window will use. Default is 100.
25 is a good value for my 23" monitor in 1920x1080 resolution.
WINDOW = 25
REM Determine rows and columns vDOS displays. VDE works in 60 lines under vDOS
LINS = 60
COLS = 80

AUTOEXEC.TXT

echo off
REM Use specs determine what host drives vDOS sees. vDOS uses Z:
internally, so I map my RAMdisk normally seen as Z: to X:
use C:\
use D:\
use X: Z:\
REM vDOS supports some TSRs. I run Tom Almy's modified ANSI driver
and an old PC Mag command editor ala DOSKEY
loadhigh d:\msdos\bin\nnansi.com
loadhigh d:\msdos\bin\cmdedit.com
REM Chris Dunford had an old freeware utility that could map unused
video RAM to DOS, that I ran on my old XT clone. It works in vDOS,
and provides a 704K base DOS system.
D:\MSDOS\bin\704K
REM I keep a few old DOS utilities around
path d:\msdos\bin
REM Fancy ANSI prompts R us. This one puts an inverse video status
bar at the top of the screen with current drive/directory, which stays
there wile the prompt moves down
prompt $e[s$e[H$e[7m$e[0;1m $d $e[0;7m$p$e[K$e[1;80H$e[m$e[u$e[0;1m
[$e[m$z$e[1m] $e[m
D:
cd \MSDOS\VDE
vde.exe
rem EXIT

The main gotcha with vDOS is that it only supports DOS 8+3 file names.
(The author apparently feels that iuf it isn't in real DOS, it won't
be in vDOS.) I run a patched vDOS version that adds basic LFN
support.

Works fine.
______
Dennis
https://plus.google.com/u/0/105128793974319004519

[Lofgren, Charles]

When I started using vDOS, I found the cursor didn't blink--and in a page of on-screen text (various programs, not just VDE) I find the cursor more easily if it's blinking. I couldn't locate a switch in the Config file to turn it on, so wrote the author. He said he didn't like blinking cursors, so purposely didn't include the option in Config, but within the C++ program there was an option for uncommenting the blinking section. I'm not a programmer guy and knew nothing about C++, but managed to get in and change the code. Now my cursor blinks. I don't know if in later versions of vDOS the option now exists within the Config file itself.

Charlie Lofgren

--------------------------------------------------------------
clof...@cmc.edu

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[Wes Medlin]

Dennis,

Thanks for posting your vDOS config files. The one thing I've been looking for was FRAME=ON. The vDOS window just looked so strange floating around in Windows without a border I gave up on using it.

I'm running the version that was patched for LFN as well. If you're going to work on a Windows computer, you at least have to be able to see files and folders that have long file names.

With vDOS, I use VDE every day as my text editor on my Windows 7 Pro machine at work. I started with VDE 1.3, back around the time it came out, and have never found another editor I like as well.

Wes

[dmccunney]

On Wed, Nov 4, 2015 at 3:20 PM, Wes Medlin <wesm...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks for posting your vDOS config files.

You're welcome.

> The one thing I've been looking for was FRAME=ON. The vDOS window just
> looked so strange floating around in Windows without a border I gave up on
> using it.

I was a bit bemused by the default of no frame.

But the vDOS config files are pretty well commented, so finding that
option wasn't a problem.

Some experimentation is required to get things set up as preferred. A
fun bit for me was printing, as I generally have no need to do that
from a DOS app. I have vDOS set up so that stuff that would
ordinarily go to a printer redirects to a file, which I can print from
Windows if required.

And the same commentary made here previously about running VDE in an
NTVDM process under WinXP applies to vDOS. If you shell out of VDE,
you are in the native Windows environment, talking to CMD.EXE, and the
usual restrictions applying to shelling out under DOS mostly don't
apply.

> I'm running the version that was patched for LFN as well. If you're going to
> work on a Windows computer, you at least have to be able to see files and
> folders that have long file names.

Yeah, I don't agree with the developer's views. You need to be able
to see stuff that doesn't use the short name, so I was delighted when
another programmer issued the patched version.

> With vDOS, I use VDE every day as my text editor on my Windows 7 Pro machine
> at work. I started with VDE 1.3, back around the time it came out, and have
> never found another editor I like as well.

I'm not that hardcore. I seldom use an actual word processor. Most
of what I do is handled by a text editor. The standard text editor
here is Notepad2-mod, a fork of Florian Ballmer's open source Notepad2
product. Notepad2 is intended to replace Windows Notepad, and can be
used to do so via a registry hack. It is based on Neil Hodgson's
Scintilla edit control, which adds code folding and syntax
highlighting for various languages. Notepad2 invokes almost
instantaneously. I run a Firefox addon called It's All Text, which
can open the content of text areas on a website in a local editor.
Notepad2 serves wonderfully for the purpose, and makes participation
in various online forums a lot easier. It doesn't use WordStar key
mapping, but you can't have everything.

You can find Notepad2-mod here: https://xhmikosr.github.io/notepad2-mod/
and Florian's original here: http://www.flos-freeware.ch/notepad2.html

VDE is here mostly to keep my hand in.

> Wes
______
Dennis