Category : Batch File Utilities - mostly for DOS
Archive   : RBSETENV.ZIP
Filename : README

 
Output of file : README contained in archive : RBSETENV.ZIP
These are a couple of small utilities designed to add some flexibility in
preparing arguments to commands and setting of environment variables
in the MSDOS command.com shell. They are also useful under
4DOS, although they are not so neccessary there.

Eval runs any named command, after wildcard filename expansion,
command substitution, and environment variable substitution.
Since the named command is a sub-process of "eval", setting of environment
variables will not be useful.

Setenv sets an environment variable into the parent environment, after
performing the same substitutions as above. It can be used to
capture the output of any program which writes to stdout. Setenv can
produce environment variables longer than the MSDOS 127 character
command line limit, since the expansion is performed internally.

As examples of using setenv in collaboration with simple programs
that write to stdout, the following are included:
addpath: add a specified directory to the end of the current path

inspath: insert a specified directory into the current path
delpath: delete a specified directory from the current path
chgpath: change a specified directory into something else.
e.g.
setenv PATH `addpath \new\directory`

As examples of using the environment setting routines directly, the
following are included:
incr: increment an integer valued environment variable directly
uprompt: set the variable PROMPT to the current directory, (with forward
slashes instead of backslashes)

Notes:
Command.com 4.01 SET command does not work properly when the
strings get too long. The environment is correct, and is displayed
correctly by other programs which read it. It seems that COMMAND
assumes the strings cannot be more than 127 characters. I don't know about
earlier versions.

4dos uses backquotes for it's own parsing, so you must protect the
command substitutions with enclosing double quotes.

ms_sh (bourne shell clone) does not really need this utility, but if
you use it, it changes what DOS considers to be the environment.
However this is NOT what sh passes on to child processes so it will
not do you much good.

Temporary files used for command substitution are all placed in a
directory pointed to by %TMP (if set). Considerable speed increase
can be gained by making this a RAMdisk. Also, copying the shell
there and pointing %COMSPEC at it will speed things up.

These programs (source code and binaries) are placed in the public domain.

R. Brittain 10/19/90


  3 Responses to “Category : Batch File Utilities - mostly for DOS
Archive   : RBSETENV.ZIP
Filename : README

  1. Very nice! Thank you for this wonderful archive. I wonder why I found it only now. Long live the BBS file archives!

  2. This is so awesome! 😀 I’d be cool if you could download an entire archive of this at once, though.

  3. But one thing that puzzles me is the “mtswslnkmcjklsdlsbdmMICROSOFT” string. There is an article about it here. It is definitely worth a read: http://www.os2museum.com/wp/mtswslnk/