WELCOME TO THE HYPE UTILITIES, VOLUME 1 Thank you for using The HYPE Utilities(TM), volume 1. We're convinced that this is the best collection of utility programs ever distributed absolutely free by a company in Costa Mesa, California. License agreement You'll be happy to know that this license agreement requires you to copy and distribute these files to your friends and associates. In fact, you will be required to return the original diskette and manual to us if you don't give away at least ten copies monthly. To this end we have included the manual on the distribution diskette in the form of a text file for easy documented use by anyone. You may use and distribute these programs freely. You may include them in your own commercial software, if you wish. The only restriction is that copyright notices are not removed. You will never be charged for the use of these programs, so you may not claim ownership of them. Don't be misled--we offer no support, advice, consolation or companionship in connection with the HYPE Utilities, volume 1. This is a "use at your own risk" situation. Used properly these files will Help You Program Excellently. Misused, you could get absolutely nowhere in life. Let's be careful out there. About this manual The software is free. So don't expect a three volume user manual with tutorials and screen dumps. Those things are for wimps anyway. Each of the utilities is explained individually. We show you the proper FORMAT, WHAT IT DOES, WHAT IT'S FOR, refer you to SEE ALSO, and give an EXAMPLE of its use. We take pride in having used less than ten pieces of paper to document all of this. The rain forest is being destroyed, you know. Plus, it really kept our costs down. The HYPE utilities (tm), volume 1 Page 2 About the company We are a software development company committed to better software solutions. Our commercial products include BUILDER, a batch file compiler and language extender, and WarpLink, the only multilingual linker supporting dynamic overlays. Our offices are located at 666 West Baker, Suite 405, Costa Mesa, California, 92626. We can be reached by phone at (714) 668-9234, FAX at (714) 979-2813 and BBS at (714) 668-9662. We are also available to you through Compuserve at ID 70771,3320. We currently distribute our products worldwide through foreign distributors and in the US through our dealer network. We have not yet begun to code. Copyright (c) 1990 by hyperkinetix, inc. The HYPE utilities (tm), volume 1 Page 3 ABOUT THESE PROGRAMS Here's a quick reference to the programs included in the HYPE Utilities, Volume 1. Program What it does ALL2DAY.EXE Lists all files on disk created today APATH.COM Adds a directory to your PATH BEEP.COM Beeps DIRS.EXE Lists directory names only FF.EXE Searches the whole disk for a file FREE.COM Displays available disk space MEM.COM Displays memory statistics RESTPATH.COM Changes to a directory whose name was saved in a file with SAVEPATH.COM SAVEPATH Saves the current directory for later use by RESTPATH.COM SHOWTIME.COM Displays the day, date, and time in an attractive format TIMER.EXE Times program execution TODAY.EXE Lists all files in the current directory that were created today in a DIR-like format The HYPE utilities (tm), volume 1 Page 4 Program ALL2DAY.EXE Format ALL2DAY [d:] By Tom Campbell What it does Displays all of the files created today on the current volume if no command line argument is given. If a drive specification is given, searches that volume instead. What it's for Quickie backups when you don't have the time to run your favorite backup program. It's easy to forget some of the files you've used or created in the course of a busy day. See also TODAY Examples rem List all of the files created today on the rem current drive. ALL2DAY rem List all of the files created today on drive rem D: ALL2DAY D: The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 5 Program APATH.COM Format APATH [[-] ] By David Rude and Doug Amaral What it does APATH with no parameters displays the path and a help screen. APATH with , a directory name, adds that directory to the path. APATH followed by a minus sign, a space, and a directory name removes that directory from the path. What it's for Installation programs tend to add directories to the path willy-nilly. Power users often don't like a big path just to run their favorite apps; APATH lets you have the best of both worlds. Example rem Add BASIC 7 on drive F: to the path. APATH F:\BC7\BIN rem Remove it. APATH - F:\BC7\BIN The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 6 Program BEEP.COM Format BEEP By Tom Campbell What it does Beeps. What it's for Beeping. Example BEEP The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 7 Program DIRS.EXE Format DIRS By Tom Campbell What it does Displays all of the subdirectories in the current directory in a format similar to that of DIR. What it's for The only alternative to DIRS is the flawed DOS command "DIR *.", but that's slow. It will also match filenames that don't have extensions, so it can also be misleading. Example rem Display the names of all subdirectories below rem the current one. DIRS The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 8 Program FF.EXE Format FF [][][] By Tom Campbell What it does Searches the current volume (if none is specified) or for all files matching . What it's for Lets you search quickly through a disk for duplicate filenames or files whose names you're not quite sure of without going through the laborious process of search each directory individually. See also ALL2DAY, TODAY Examples rem Search drive C for all files ending in .BIN. FF c:*.bin rem Search this drive for the file JOANNA.DOC FF JOANNA.DOC The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 9 Program FREE.COM Format FREE [d:] By Tom Campbell What it does Displays available disk space, total disk space, and disk space in use on specified drive. If no drive is specified, prints these values for the current drive. A colon isn't necessary after the drive spec. What it's for Lets you get the disk usage stats you normally run CHKDSK for without doing the myriad other tasks CHKDSK performs. Prints the numbers with commas, which CHKDSK doesn't bother to do. See also MEM Examples rem Show disk use stats for drive F. FREE F: rem This also does the same thing: FREE f rem Show stats for the current volume. FREE The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 10 Program MEM.COM Format MEM By Tom Campbell What it does Displays the amount of free DOS and EMS memory. Shows both totals and amount available. What it's for Power users often forget when they've shelled out to DOS from another program. This gives you a clue as to whether that's happened without having to EXIT back in and wait for reinitialization. This is also a handy utility to give naive users who may not know whether they have EMS. If you're supporting them over the phone, just have them run this handy little program to tell you what you need to know. See also FREE Example rem Show free memory: MEM The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 11 Program RESTPATH.COM Format RESTPATH By Tom Campbell What it does Goes to the directory named in . Note for power The format is different from that of a simple CD > users , because the directory name is terminated by an ASCII 0, not a newline. What it's for Allowing batch files to "remember" one or more directories. Typically this happens when a batch file needs to return to the place it started from, but doesn't know in advance where that directory is. See also SAVEPATH Example rem Go back to the directory whose name was saved rem in the file C:\OLDPATH.TXT and delete that rem file after returning. RESTPATH c:\oldpath.txt del c:\oldpath.txt The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 12 Program SAVEPATH.COM Format SAVEPATH By Tom Campbell What it does Writes the current drive, path, and directory name to for later use by RESTPATH. You should always specify a full pathname for the file, since the whole point is to go from a relative position (the current directory, wherever that is) to an absolute position (your starting point). What it's for Batch files that need to let a user change the starting directory but return to it later under program control. See also RESTPATH Example rem Save the current directory name in a file called rem OLDPATH.TXT in the root directory of drive C. SAVEPATH C:\OLDPATH.TXT The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 13 Program SHOWTIME.COM Format SHOWTIME By Tom Campbell What it does Displays the current time, day, month, date, and year. What it's for Good to toss in as the last part of your AUTOEXEC, or for a menu program. Its output can be redirected, so you can funnel it into an ASCII text file for logging purposes. Example rem Start off today's activities log. SHOWTIME > TODAY.TXT The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 14 Program TIMER.EXE Format TIMER START|STOP By Tom Campbell What it does Times the execution of programs. To start the timer, enter this at the DOS prompt: TIMER START Do whatever it is you want timed, then issue this command: TIMER STOP The elapsed time will be displayed. Granularity of timing is 1 second. What it's for Everyone wants to know how fast programs run. This beats the manual stopwatch method because you can put it into batch files. See also SHOWTIME The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 15 Example First, initialize the timer: C:\>TIMER START Next, run a program: C:\>SORT < DATABASE.PRN > NEWBASE.PRN Finally, display the execution time: C:\>TIMER STOP The HYPE utilities, volume 1 Page 16 Program TODAY.EXE Format TODAY [][][] By Tom Campbell What it does Displays in a form similar to the DIR command all files created today in the specified directory. If no directory is given, lists matching files in the current directory. What it's for Often what you want in a directory listing is just those files you created today, and there's no easy way of doing just that without TODAY. See also ALL2DAY Example rem List all of today's files in the current directory. TODAY rem List all of today's files in the \BUILDER rem directory of drive E: TODAY E:\BUILDER rem List all of today's files in the current rem directory of drive C: TODAY C: