HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: cb@tamarack13.timbuk (Chris Brewster)
Subject: Re: Thoughts during my forced OS/2 sabbatical
In-reply-to: dic5340@hertz.njit.edu's message of 16 Oct 92 01:23:51 GMT
Organization: pubs
	<BUHR.92Oct13141023@blish.umanitoba.ca>
	<CB.92Oct15141357@tamarack13.timbuk>
	<1992Oct16.012351.1508@njitgw.njit.edu>
Date: 16 Oct 92 11:11:05 CDT

David Charlap writes:

   Why can't such a program (like PC-Shell) be written for OS/2.  File
   viewers can be applications. ...
   I think building it into the OS is silly.  On the other hand, it would
   make a very useful bundled utility, or perhaps an add-on for the WPS. ...

A separate utility would be fine with me if it would be automatically
available in all directory displays--in other words so that it would act
like part of the OS.  How it's implemented doesn't concern me as long as
I have the functionality.

Chris Brewster
cb@cray.com
From: dic5340@hertz.njit.edu (David Charlap)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: Re: Don't put program shadows on Desktop!
Date: 9 Oct 92 16:15:34 GMT
Organization: New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, N.J.

In article <1992Oct8.205804.18871@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu> rjones@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu (Ronald Jones) writes:
>I used to have desktop folders filled with shadows and on several
>occasions one or more disappeared. This followed situations in which I
>loaded to many icons (or was otherwise messing around). So far that has
>not happened using "create another". 

The obly problems I've had shadowing things is with documents.  NEVER
MAKE A SHADOW OF A DOCUMENT.  If you edit the file, the shadow gets
messed up.  Here's why (I think):

When you tell an app to save, the app (usually) doesn't just write new
data to the file.  Instead, it first deletes backup copies.  Then it
renames the old file as the new backup copy.  And it then creates a
new file to write the saved data into.

Well, as you can see, this will mess up shadows.  The first time, the
shadowed file is renamed, and the shadow becomes a shadow of the
backup copy.  The next time, the backup copy is deleted, and your
shadow is left pointing at nothing.  The next time you reboot, the
shadow has a "net" icon to indicate a file that's not on-line.

I get around this by copying the application's program reference
object and fill in the document's name on the command line field of
the settings.  This icon works as expected.

-- 
David Charlap         |"there aren't 50,000 things for which it's worth writing
dic5340@hertz.njit.edu| software; and the computer industry doesn't have enough
----------------------+ programmers to create that much good software.
Therefore, most of it must be worthless" -- Boris Beizer "The Frozen Keyboard"
From: vcl@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Victor C. Limary)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: TE/2 and 16550 UART
Date: 13 Oct 92 20:39:33 GMT
Article-I.D.: ut-emx.81626
Reply-To: vcl@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Victor C. Limary)
Distribution: usa
Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin TX
Originator: vcl@bashful.cc.utexas.edu


  I'm having problems with high speed serial communications under OS/2.  My
current setup is a 486/33, 8 megs of RAM, and an Intel 9600EX modem on com4
(on port 2e8h, irq 4, with a 16550AFN UART).  I have the computer boot up
with a call=mode com4:19200,n,8,1,buffer=auto in the config.sys, and TE/2
is configured to use com4 at a locked baud rate of 19200.  Every seems to work
fine until I try to download  using ZMODEM.  The transfer rate will start
going up, and then, sometime after the transfer rate starts to go over 1024 cps,
I get "Retry Packet" errors.
  YMODEM will work fine, but the transfer rate rarely gets over 900 cps, and so
I end up having to wait almost twice as long for transfers.   I've also
installed the latest com.sys driver (from September, I think), that's supposed
to have fixed up some problems with TE/2.
  All the above information has lead me to believe that either OS/2 or TE/2
isn't using the UART.  Is anyone  having similar problems?

Victor Limary
vcl@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu
From: dic5340@hertz.njit.edu (David Charlap)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: Re: XGA Cards - Are there any?
Date: 14 Oct 92 21:19:50 GMT
Organization: New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, N.J.

In article <1992Oct14.164244.1833@rz.uni-karlsruhe.de> UKI6@DKAUNI2.BITNET (leo richardson) writes:
>
>Can you use the built/in IBM-8514/A drivers for the ATI Graphics
>Vantage/Ultra?

Yes, but only for 1024x768x256 mode.  The other modes that ATI uses,
and any extended features will not be available.  You must have 1MB on
the board to use IBM's driver.  I think it'll give you an accelerated
640x480x256 mode with 512K onboard.

>"Is having to". What standards (for ISA) are supported today? Does
>anyone have good experience with third-party drivers? Are Trident,
>Tseng, Oak, S3 going to work in OS/2?
>(I 'm planning to buy a new computer, that 's why I 'm asking so many
>questions ....)

If you're going to buy a new computer anyway, here's my
recommendations:

1) VGA will always work.  It's an IBM standard, so if your board is
   register-level compatible with a VGA (as most are today), you'll
   get 640x480x16.
2) IBM-supported standards will always be supported.  IBM doesn't
   abandon their standards.  This means that anything which is 8514/a
or XGA compatible will have drivers, although you may be limited to
the IBM specification for the standard (ignoring extensions that 3rd
party vendors like to add).
3) For other sVGA boards:

-> Hercules boards are unsupported.  Hercules wants nothing to do
   with OS/2.
-> Trident boards have lots of drivers.  They are supported by
   Trident, not by IBM.  There is an 800x600x16 seamless Windows
   driver for these boards.  No other non-VGA boards have seamless
   Windows drivers at this time.  The IBM service pack may change
   this.
-> ATI has 16-bit drivers meant for OS/2 1.3.  They will work with
   2.0, but you're going to miss out on some speed and/or features.
   ATI doesn't want to develop anything else, apparantly.  I think IBM
   is going to continue developing ATI drivers.
-> Tseng-based boards have had problems, but I think good drivers will
   be available in IBM's service pack.  If you get an Orchid board
   (not a generic Tseng board) you can get drivers from Orchid which
   (I'm told) work well.
-> S3 accelerated boards are not supported yet.  I don't know if there
   is a plan to get OS/2 drivers out.
-> Oak Technologies boards are not really compatible, although IBM is
   working on it.  I'd wait and see if the service pack fixes this.

If you're not sure, ask the manufacturer about OS/2 2.0 drivers.  If
they don't have them, ask IBM if there will be any in the service
pack.  If both companies say "no", then don't buy the board.


-- 
David Charlap         |"there aren't 50,000 things for which it's worth writing
dic5340@hertz.njit.edu| software; and the computer industry doesn't have enough
----------------------+ programmers to create that much good software.
Therefore, most of it must be worthless" -- Boris Beizer "The Frozen Keyboard"
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
From: lkan@uhunix.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (Linus Kan)
Subject: Disk fragmentation 
Organization: University of Hawaii
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 04:34:51 GMT

I understand HPFS always keep disks unfragmented.  My file system
is FAT instead, and I'm wondering if there are any defragmentation
utility for OS/2--like Norton's Speed Disk; but of course I was
discouraged from using it.  

I just attended a OS/2 workshop at IBM--during a non-intensive
practice/tour session, OS/2 hanged the system on two occasions:
when trying to read a empty disk drive and when changing 
settings of a folder.  Sadly enough, the IBM rep. had to warm 
boot.

Yeah, about the disk fragmentation...please e-mail me. 

:) lkan@uhunix.uhcc.hawaii.edu
From: mikel@networx.com (Mike Lempriere)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: Re: Trident 8900C 800x600x16 and DOS problems
Date: 7 Oct 92 22:10:33 GMT
Article-I.D.: networx.1992Oct7.221033.5399
Organization: NetWorx
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]

So last night I tried some of the things described in this file to get
my trident card working.  All to no avail.

I pulled all other cards, ran SVGA card and hard-drive only, no difference.
I removed the jumper on my trident card to do 72hz as described in an
earlier note in this file.  I XMODEMed down fresh copies of each driver I
tried, to make sure my month old copies transmitted ok.
I did SVGA ONs, I did DDINSTALs, I did LOTS of reboots to OS/2 1.3 to copy
the original DISPLAY.DLL back into \OS2\DLL.

I tried ALT-F1 at boot-timee as described somewhere in this file.

*** WARNING *** WARNING *** WARNING *** WARNING ***
*** WARNING *** WARNING *** WARNING *** WARNING ***

Don't use ALT-F1 at boot-time!  It nukes your desktop!

*** WARNING *** WARNING *** WARNING *** WARNING ***
*** WARNING *** WARNING *** WARNING *** WARNING ***

Your machine will be back to the way it was when you first installed 2.0.
Right down to the dang Tutorial.  And while it lets you fiddle with the
mouse, it merrily axes your desktop.

Anyways, I found some reference to a VSVGA.SYS patch in an earlier note
in this file, I will look for that on hobbes.
Organization: Junior, Math/Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 23:42:54 -0400 
From: "Stephen M. Lacy" <sl31+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: OS/2 ate my whole harddrive!


Yes, I was compiling along, (gcc-2.2.2) got the old "The system has
stopped" message (which has been happening all too often, not related to
gcc though)  Powered Down, powered up and got "Missing Operating System"
 Then, pulled out the handy-dandy OS/2 boot floppy disk that I made, it
worked, insert original disk numer 2, and do a "chkdsk c: /f:3" and got
a message something like "cannot find the specified device" or whatever.
 Went over to C:, did a DIR and noticed that my volume label was gone,
and did a dir and got a "The system cannot find the file specified"  The
entire hadrrive was gone.  

I suspect TCP/IP 1.2.1.  ever since I applied the 1.2.1 patch from 1.2,
I've been getting trap's in KBD$ all the time (my machine is on all day)
 It would crash about every day, maybe twice a day.  I've also been
getting strange harddrive things happening.  Usually chkdsk will say
something like "SYS0519 The disk has errors"  (I'm not sure about the
519, I'd have to go home and check)  But, I can boot a floppy, do a
chkdsk c: /f:3 and everything is fine for a couple of days.  I would
suspect a faulty harddrive, but I'm not sure, because I've never lost
any data, other than just now, when I lost everything.  I'm not pleased.
 I like OS/2, and this has really peeved me, but its back and things are
rolling again, I'll just see how they go. 

Steve


"Please, stay misunderstood." -The Hollow Men
From: sl31+@andrew.cmu.edu (Stephen M. Lacy)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: Re: Why XGA-2?
Date: 13 Oct 92 05:28:58 GMT
Organization: Junior, Math/Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA

Excerpts from netnews.comp.os.os2.misc: 12-Oct-92 Why XGA-2? by
Alexander Maldutis@cunix 
> background than OS/2, not to mention file viewing and such].  To my 
> knowledge, the ATI boards won't be that terribly more expensive than the XGA,
> and give you putatively faster performance with more colors.

I don't know any of the specs for XGA-2 in terms of speed, but I would
wager to say that it is close to THE FASTEST video card on the market. 
What makes it so fast, you ask?  1. It's a busmaster.  This means you
say to the video card "copy this block of memory from X to Y" where X is
in VRAM, and Y is in regular RAM, and you don't have to wait, the card
goes ahead and does it while your CPU does other things.  2. It has a
32-bit interface.  I'm sure you've seen the difference between 8 and 16
bit VGA cards, well I'm sure the difference between a 16 bit card and a
32 bit card is all the greater (guess you'll have to get MCA for this
one...he he he) 3. XGA (the original version) I believe was already
rated as fast as the ATI 8514/Ultra.  XGA-2 claims 5 times the speed of
XGA, if I remember right (don't quote me on this one, though)   That's
speed.  Why all the fuss with colors.  Can you really tell the
difference bettween 256 and 65k at that high of a resolution, and the
real question is, do you need it.  If you say that you run multimedia
applications with realtime video, I'll believe you, but I doubt the
majority of users really need that many colors and that high of a
resolution.  

Steve


"I don't like much really, do I?  But what I do like, I love
passionately!" -Pet Shop Boys
From: sam_s@NeXT.com (Sam Streeper)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: how do I get just a few files back from installation disks?
Date: 16 Oct 92 06:57:20 GMT
Reply-To: sam_s@NeXT.com

I accidentally deleted my "Command Prompts" folder (the one that provides a DOS  
window...)  Is there an easy way to get it back?  How do I make use of those  
files on the installation disks?

thanx!
-sam

--
Opinions expressed herein are not those of my employer.  They're not even
mine.  They're probably wrong besides.  How did they get in here, anyway?
From: sproles@pine.circa.ufl.edu (SPROLES)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: how to change from windows to os2...reformat???
Date: 8 Oct 92 03:22:22 GMT
Reply-To: sproles@pine.circa.ufl.edu
Distribution: usa
Organization: University of Florida  (ufl.edu)
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.3-4



I am buying 8MB more memory to total 12mb and am buying os2 because
everytime I run a dos communications program from windows and try to exit
the whole dam thing siezes. have to turn off power and reboot, Ctrl,alt,del
doesnt work! Have your system freeze while in a compu$serve premium area
and you can afford the memory upgrade easier than trying to figure what
went wrong in the "windoze".

Anyway, please tell me if I need to reformat the hard drive to get windows 
off of it.  Any insidious (read heinous) hidden files that won't delete?
( I tried deleting and system told me it was using a file...???)
Oh yeah Ive got an Austin 386-33, currently 4MB, 126mb HD, etc and a 
Paradise accel. video card with 1mb memory, SVGA      Will the card work with
OS 2?

Please e-mail replies, If anyone else is interested in answers i get, e-mail
and I'll post     Thanks for helping me (saving me?)

Judy Sproles

SPROLES@PINE.CIRCA.UFL.EDU
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
From: wkn@leland.Stanford.EDU (Ken Neighbors)
Subject: Re: Changing Font for Shadowed Text
Organization: DSG, Stanford University, CA 94305, USA
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 92 16:33:46 GMT

In article <1992Oct16.122809.11112@rz.uni-karlsruhe.de> ralf@ubka.uni-karlsruhe.de (Ralf Grohmann) writes:
>How can I change the color of the text of shadowed icons (which is 
>usually a little grayed out and quite unreadable under any color except
>for the standard light grey background)?

Open the Scheme Palette;
Open a Scheme;
Select Window Area: Shadow Text;
Change the color;
Drag the Scheme to your desktop with while holding down ALT.

NOTE:  This will destroy all your other colors!  And it will
change the shadow text system-wide.  It doesn't work unless
you hold the ALT key.  I think IBM knows about this.

Ken
wkn@leland.stanford.edu
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
From: shurr@cbnews.cb.att.com (larry.a.shurr)
Subject: Orchid drivers on non-Orchid boards(was: XGA Cards - Are there any?)
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Columbus, OH
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1992 13:54:07 GMT

In article <1992Oct14.211950.1589@njitgw.njit.edu> dic5340@hertz.njit.edu (David Charlap) writes:
>In article <1992Oct14.164244.1833@rz.uni-karlsruhe.de> UKI6@DKAUNI2.BITNET (leo richardson) writes:
>>(I 'm planning to buy a new computer, that 's why I 'm asking so many
>>questions ....)
>If you're going to buy a new computer anyway, here's my
>recommendations:
>   [...]
>3) For other sVGA boards:
>   [...]
>-> Tseng-based boards have had problems, but I think good drivers will
>   be available in IBM's service pack.  If you get an Orchid board
>   (not a generic Tseng board) you can get drivers from Orchid which
>   (I'm told) work well.

Many people know I practically plastered the net with questions about
ET4000 support problems I had before I got them resolved.  Just so you
know: the Orchid drivers work well with many, though not all, ET4000-
based SVGA boards, including my Diamond SpeedStar (non-Hicolor).  They
do not, howver, provide seemless Windows drivers.  For full-screen
Windows drivers, I am using Tseng drivers I downloaded from 
cica.indiana.edu.  They always have recent versions of the Tseng 
drivers as shipped by Diamond with the SpeedStar, so I get my updates
there.

I look forward to the service pack's generic Tseng drivers which, I
have heard, include support for 1024x768x256.  Since there are no 
16-color versions, I hope that 32-bit GRE + 32-bit drivers will 
provide a good speed boost -- I found the Orchid 256 color drivers a
little sluggish (and the colors are off, too), so I use 16 colors.
I'd rather use 256, and did so in Windows after new quicker Windows
drivers became available a year or so ago.

I understand that IBM will provide their generic drivers to the various
vendors as examples for them to follow in creating drivers for their
boards.  Diamond has said it won't develop its own drivers until the
32-bit GRE is available.  This is annoying, and it sounds like a bad
attitude, but it might be defensiveness or merely annoyance with IBM.
Alledgedly, IBM screwed over video board vendors by failing to provide
OEM documentation for writing the device drivers because someone within
IBM canned the contract writers who were working on it.  The alledged
action is attributed to an IBM middle manager who did it as a "cost
savings." Since I have seen just that sort of thing happen several
times in projects I have worked on, I now find such stories believable.

Larry
-- 
Larry A. Shurr (las@cbnmva.att.com or att!cbnmva!las) speaking only for myself.
EOR (end-of-ramble)
From: rupa@f-454.fidonet.org (Rupa Schomaker)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: WPS Lockup
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 22:11:00 -0600

parry@yoyo.cc.monash.edu.au (Tom J Parry) writes:

 TJP> As an alternative for people who want to have a screen blanker but no
 TJP> lockup, get scrutil from ftp-os2 (or is it scrutl?). It blanks your
 TJP> screen after a configurable time period of inactivity and comes back with
 TJP> either a keypress or mouse movement. You can also force screen blanking
 TJP> by moving the mouse pointer to the top right of the screen or inhibit it
 TJP> by moving to the bottom right. It also has a little date/time/free_mem PM
 TJP> window.

Does it work while full-screen apps are the focus?

--
   UUCP -> rupa@f-454.fidonet.org     FidoNet ->  1:106/1024

  The world  is a fine place and worth fighting for.
          Ernest Hemingway
From: adhir@cygnus.umd.edu (Alok Dhir)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: Re: Scanner driver's GP fault
Date: 13 Oct 92 19:25:26 GMT
Organization: /etc/organization

In article <1992Oct13.101724.1@vax1.umkc.edu> ghdai@vax1.umkc.edu writes:
>Hi, there,
>
>Just before my lab upgraded the OS for a 486 machine, my boss bought a
>flatbed scanner (Envision ENV3000, Mustek 3000C-compatible).  I had objected
>him in buying it because it came with Micrografx's Picture Publisher LE for
>Windoze.  What we need is OS/2 version of the software.  But all is too late.
>The PP could drive the scanner when windoze 3.1 was there, buy after
>installing OS/2 2.0, it cannot be used any more since the MUSTEKA4 scanner
>driver causes GP fault once you try to scan.  Anybody knows what can be done
>to solve the problem, please give me a reply.  Thanks in advance.

Try installing the beta with Win3.1 support and see if that will do the job.

Good luck...
-- 
 ============================================================================
 Al Dhir                      			   Technical Consulting Staff
 Internet: adhir@cygnus.umd.edu	  	 University of Maryland, College Park
 Bitnet:   adhir%cygnus.umd.edu@Interbit      (301) 405-1500 * (301) 405-3014
From: kitchin@avo.hp.com (Bruce Kitchin)
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
Subject: Re: Install on HP Vectra QS/20
Date: 9 Oct 92 21:27:36 GMT
Article-I.D.: scd.BvvIA0.4HC
Organization: Hewlett-Packard, Santa Clara Division
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1.3 PL6]

On ftp-os2.nmsu.edu there is an HIL mouse driver for OS/2 2.0.  It is, however,
labeled as BETA, so no guarantees.  Another suggestion, if you have access
to Compuserve, try the HP forums there and ask for help.  They will be able
to give you HP's official position.  I think the forum you want is HPSYS.
If that doesn't find an HP forum, GO HP and choose the system forum unless
there is a newer better sounding choice.  It would be in the Vectra section.

Good luck, Bruce
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
From: sip1@ellis.uchicago.edu (Timothy F. Sipples)
Subject: Re: xga-2 questions
Reply-To: sip1@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: Dept. of Econ., Univ. of Chicago
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 16:32:30 GMT

In article <1992Oct13.113201.11189@ultb.isc.rit.edu> jks4675@ritvax.isc.rit.edu writes:
>1) What sort of Win-OS/2 support is/will be offered??

Full support -- including seamless.

>2) How much does the card from radius cost (ISA)?

Suspected street price is in the $200s.

>3) Are they claiming that it will work on 'all' monitors?

VGA on up.  Of course, the modes available will depend on the
capabilities of your monitor.

>4) How many hours will it take to get this to work on OS/2??

Nothing beyond a normal install -- XGA is a stock, out-of-the-box
driver.

-- 
Timothy F. Sipples      | The OS/2 FREQ. ASKED QUESTIONS LIST 2.0f is avail.
sip1@ellis.uchicago.edu | from 128.123.35.151, anonymous ftp, in /pub/os2/all
Dept. of Econ., Univ.   | /faq, or from LISTSERV@BLEKUL11.BITNET (send "HELP")
of Chicago, 60637       | [For the Internet, vote Clinton-GORE this year.]
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
From: jdecarlo@mitre.org (John DeCarlo)
Subject: Re: Why do title changes lose file associations?
Organization: MITRE Corporation, McLean  VA
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1992 16:09:41 GMT

In article <1992Oct13.204905.16276@ultb.isc.rit.edu>
 jks4675@ritvax.isc.rit.edu writes:

>Why is it when I change a object's title in the settings notebook, the
>executable is 'lost'?? For instance, if I change the title for TE2.EXE to
>merely TE2, after a reboot, the icon changes to a data file icon and the
>call to the executable is lost. 

[...]

>All I did was change the object's title, not the file the icon executes.

That depends.  If you created a Program object, and filled in the name of 
the program that object calls, then what you described shouldn't have 
happened.

If you just copied the icon for that program from the Drives view to another 
folder, or even kept it in the Drives folder, but went in and changed 
something, you changed *that file*.

Unfortunately it can be tricky in OS/2 to distinguish between these two 
different cases, but it is vital.

John DeCarlo, MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA--My views are my own
Fidonet:  1:109/131  Internet:  jdecarlo@mitre.org
Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.misc
From: ileicht@jarthur.claremont.edu (Spiff)
Subject: Re: running unreal demo, want sound under OS/2 (and don`t wanna boot dos!)
Organization: Harvey Mudd College, Claremont, CA 91711
Distribution: usa
Date: Thu, 15 Oct 1992 22:41:09 GMT


unreal demo is available at ftp.ulowell.edu 
/msdos/Graphics/Eurodemo  (or something very life that)

There is a thread about it on comp.graphics as well.