krogers@esunix.UUCP (Keith Rogers) (05/27/89)
My place of employment is a VMS bastion, but we do have a few ULTRIX
machines around. I got an account on one a while back and, after the
intital shock of unix's tersness, I've really taken to its 'look &
feel'. I'm finding I wish I had many of its commands for my PC.
From what I've read, the MKS Toolkit is what I want, but I don't know
any of the nitty-gritty details that can make or break such a utility
and I don't know anyone who has ever used it. So I have a list of
questions here which I hope someone out there can answer:
1) I believe that command.com is replaced by some other shell. How big
is it? (My concern here is of course the 640k memory restriction on
dos.) Can it reside in epanded memory, which I don't have but am
considering getting?
2) Does something need to be done to run canned dos programs; i.e. does
command.com need to be reinstalled or something? I guess I'm very
fuzzy on how MKS Toolkit relates to BIOS, etc.
3) The bottom line is: will it run at an 'acceptable' speed on my AT&T
PC6300 (an 8086 based 8 Mhz XT like machine)? I do have a hard disk
(who doesn't?) but it's not terribly fast. I'm posting this article
so that I don't get a sales pitch to this question. No doubt Mortice
Kern would tell me it's the greatest thing since sliced bread, even
on my lowly machine.
I am looking for any information from people who actually use or have
tried the MKS Toolkit. Post or e-mail as you see fit. Thanks in
advance,
Keith Rogers UUCP: utah-cs!esunix!krogers, or you might try
uplherc!esunix!krogers hedrick@geneva.rutgers.edu (Charles Hedrick) (05/29/89)
You can install the MKS toolkit in several ways, depending upon how much compatibility with Unix you want. The minimum way gives you a bunch of Unix-compatibility utilities that you call as DOS programs from COMMAND.COM. That should always be safe. It gives you the commands you're used to from Unix, but not a Unix shell. Since COMMAND.COM knows about > < and in some limited way |, you might find it livable. Next is to run ksh from AUTOEXEC.BAT. That does use memory, though not a lot (sorry, I don't know the exact number). That would work with almost all DOS programs. Finally, you can replace COMMAND.COM completely. If any program is somehow expecting to use a piece of COMMAND.COM (e.g. for error handling), this could cause trouble. Another issue is using / for file names and - for options instead of \ and /. There's a command that does that change. It uses an undocumented feature of DOS to change the "switch character". I do that, but it's optional. Most software works OK that way, but now and then some doesn't. MKS has suggested changes that will get lots of things working, but in the worst case you may have to live with \. The problem is that this was never a documented part of MS-DOS, so some software doesn't support it. Apparently it is becoming more of a problem in newer releases of DOS. Changing \ and / to / and - used to be a more or less supported feature, but it looks like Microsoft is trying to get rid of it. In DOS 3.2 most of DOS knows what is going on, and displays file names with / when you tell it to. One reasonable approach would be to talk to MKS and tell them what version of DOS and what other software you are using. They seem to know what problems there are with most of the standard software. They'll be able to tell you how much Unix emulation you can get with what you're using. They seem to give pretty good support. There's a good chance that you'll be able to get a fairly completely Unix emulation. Speed doesn't seem to be an issue. I've seen no signs of the MKS stuff being slower than the normal DOS utilities. It's real DOS software, after all. It just acts like Unix software. There's no reason for it to have any more overhead than other DOS software.
arunc@uxe.cso.uiuc.edu (05/30/89)
>>1) I believe that command.com is replaced by some other shell. How big >> is it? (My concern here is of course the 640k memory restriction on >> dos.) Can it reside in epanded memory, which I don't have but am >> considering getting? command.com doesn't have to be replaced, although it can by replaced by MKS's version of the Korn shell. As yet, their shell can't be placed in expanded memory. As for how much space it takes up, that depends upon how much space you allow it to have, how many aliases you have, whether you want to be able to "suspend" a vi job and return to DOS, etc. I believe the minimum that it requires is 70K, though I might be wrong on that. >>2) Does something need to be done to run canned dos programs; i.e. does >> command.com need to be reinstalled or something? I guess I'm very >> fuzzy on how MKS Toolkit relates to BIOS, etc. No, nothing has to be done to run "canned" DOS programs. I regularly use WordPerfect, Procomm, Kermit, DBaseIII, PC-Paint, with no problems. If your program has to load up an additional version of command.com in order to run another DOS program (for example, if I want to edit a DBaseIII program file with vi rather than the DBase built-in editor) THEN (and only in such analogous situations) you might run into a problem, as the calling program has to have itself loaded, a version of command.com loaded, PLUS the program you want to run. >>3) The bottom line is: will it run at an 'acceptable' speed on my AT&T >> PC6300 (an 8086 based 8 Mhz XT like machine)? I do have a hard disk >> (who doesn't?) but it's not terribly fast. I'm posting this article >> so that I don't get a sales pitch to this question. No doubt Mortice >> Kern would tell me it's the greatest thing since sliced bread, even >> on my lowly machine. I've used the Toolkit on an AT&T 6300+ for the past year and a half. The machine is not fast (I think it's about the same speed as yours). Loading up the Korn shell below command.com does slow things down, but the slow down is marginal. And yes, it is the greatest thing since sliced bread, it's toasted bread with hot butter and strawberry jam! :) :) >>I am looking for any information from people who actually use or have >>tried the MKS Toolkit. Post or e-mail as you see fit. Thanks in >>advance, >> >>Keith Rogers UUCP: utah-cs!esunix!krogers, or you might try >> uplherc!esunix!krogers I think the product is great, and the people who make it have responded in a friendly and intelligent manner to any questions I've posed them. I've written numerous shell scripts, using MKS's ksh, awk, sed, fgrep, etc., and they've all run well. They required only small modifications in order to run in a BSD UNIX or Sys5V3 environment, the changes mostly having to do with syntactical differences. Buy the MKS Toolkit, and keep those people in business! Arun Chandra arunc@uiucuxe.CSO.UIUC.EDU
wheels@mks.UUCP (Gerry Wheeler) (05/30/89)
In article <1283@esunix.UUCP> krogers@esunix.UUCP (Keith Rogers) writes: >From what I've read, the MKS Toolkit is what I want... >1) I believe that command.com is replaced by some other shell. How big > is it? The code of our Korn shell is 64K, and the data will about 16K, depending on what aliases, functions, etc., you have defined. This is larger than command.com, and may cause problems for very large programs. However, use of the kshell is optional, and you can easily change from kshell to command.com whenever you want (or need). >2) Does something need to be done to run canned dos programs; i.e. does > command.com need to be reinstalled or something? I guess I'm very > fuzzy on how MKS Toolkit relates to BIOS, etc. The Toolkit is a collection of standard DOS programs that emulate Unix utilities. For example, it includes vi.exe, diff.exe, sort.exe, and so on. The shell, which may be used as a replacement for command.com, is also just a DOS executable called sh.exe. (Keep in mind that command.com is just a normal DOS program too. It is the default program the DOS kernel loads, but that can be overridden with the SHELL= command in config.sys.) So, you can pretty well mix and match. You can use command.com to run our programs, or you can use our Korn shell to run your usual DOS programs. >3) will it run at an 'acceptable' speed on my AT&T PC6300? Yes, I don't think you'll see much difference. We have noted that some commands (rm, for example) are a little slower than the DOS equivalents (such as del or erase). This seems to be because the DOS commands use the very old DOS calls which are more efficient than the newer calls with file handles. In normal use this is not noticeable. > I'm posting this article so that I don't get a sales pitch to this > question. That's understandable. I've seen other responses already posted, so I hope you feel you're getting all sides of the story. That's what the net is all about. I just wanted to let you know some of the details that others may not have available. -- Gerry Wheeler Phone: (519)884-2251 Mortice Kern Systems Inc. UUCP: uunet!watmath!mks!wheels 35 King St. North BIX: join mks Waterloo, Ontario N2J 2W9 CompuServe: 73260,1043
glroberts@lotus.waterloo.edu (Gordon L. Roberts) (05/31/89)
In article <1283@esunix.UUCP> krogers@esunix.UUCP (Keith Rogers) writes: >1) I believe that command.com is replaced by some other shell. How big > is it? (My concern here is of course the 640k memory restriction on > dos.) Can it reside in epanded memory, which I don't have but am > considering getting? Command.com can be replaced with the Korn Shell, but this is not necessary. All the utilities run fine without using the Korn Shell, but if you want a better shell than command.com that also runs faster then use sh.exe. The Korn shell can replace command.com as the command interpreter by sticking a line in your config.sys like ``shell=c:\bin\sh.exe''. The shell takes up about 80K, but if you run it with the option to load its transient code up high then that frees up about 64K. This is the same thing that command.com does. Sh does not use expanded memory, but then again neither does command.com. I think that it is a tricky thing to run programs in expanded memory. I have only ever seen it used as data space. >2) Does something need to be done to run canned dos programs; i.e. does > command.com need to be reinstalled or something? I guess I'm very > fuzzy on how MKS Toolkit relates to BIOS, etc. DOS programs run fine because most of them don't need the command interpreter for anything. They just call DOS routines and if they need a shell then they usually invoke the shell named in COMSPEC or if they are really dumb then they will invoke command.com explicitly. You can always run command.com if your program needs it. Then again you can just run sh.exe when you need it. Both of them are just DOS programs and you can run them at will and "exit" when you are done. The only problem that I find is with the SWITCHAR. DOS does not care if \ or / is used as path separator, but / is normally the switch character so you can't use use it for paths in this case. You can make a DOS call to change it to something else like `-' to be more UNIX-like and then you can use / in paths, but some programs don't use the switchar (they hard-code / in) so they can be annoying. Up until DOS 3.3, command.com would use switchar so you could do something like ``command -c -e:512 c:/foo/bar/blech.bat''. DOS 4.01 command.com seems not to use the switch character anymore :-( arrgh. >3) The bottom line is: will it run at an 'acceptable' speed on my AT&T > PC6300 (an 8086 based 8 Mhz XT like machine)? I do have a hard disk > (who doesn't?) but it's not terribly fast. I'm posting this article > so that I don't get a sales pitch to this question. No doubt Mortice > Kern would tell me it's the greatest thing since sliced bread, even > on my lowly machine. Sure, it'll run at an acceptable speed (i.e. it won't be any slower that what you are using now). It might even be faster. Post away! That's the way to get answers and MKS usually answers technical questions, but they seem refrained about posting "advertising" except writing that a product is available. It's a UNIX environment on DOS (the best of both worlds :-) so it is the greatest thing since sliced bread :-) >I am looking for any information from people who actually use or have >tried the MKS Toolkit. Post or e-mail as you see fit. Thanks in >advance, I use VAX/UNIX 4.3BSD, SunOS and MS-DOS so if I can't make my UNIX behave like MS-DOS (why would I want to anyway) then I might as well make my MS-DOS behave like UNIX with a shell and utilities. I use lots of their stuff and I am very pleased with it. I use vi, awk, and sh the most. Now if they would only include uucp, cnews, rn, mail, cron... :-) and add in a bit of multitasking and X windows... double :-) Does it sound like I am a satisfied customer? yep :-) Do I sound tired? Yep, good night. glr/at
vu0112@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu (Cliff Joslyn) (06/01/89)
In article <14198@watdragon.waterloo.edu> glroberts@lotus.waterloo.edu (Gordon L. Roberts) writes: >The shell takes up about 80K, but if you run >it with the option to load its transient code up high then that frees >up about 64K. You're kidding?! How do I do this? -- O----------------------------------------------------------------------> | Cliff Joslyn, Cybernetician at Large | Systems Science, SUNY Binghamton, vu0112@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu V All the world is biscuit shaped. . .
poirier@ra.cs.unc.edu (Dan Poirier) (06/01/89)
In article <1010@mks.UUCP> andy@mks.UUCP (Andy Toy) writes: # In article <14198@watdragon.waterloo.edu> glroberts@lotus.waterloo.edu (Gordon L. Roberts) writes: # >``shell=c:\bin\sh.exe''. The shell takes up about 80K, but if you run # >it with the option to load its transient code up high then that frees # >up about 64K. This is the same thing that command.com does. Sh does # # This is NOT a feature of the Korn Shell (sh.exe) in the MKS Toolkit # version 2.3. Some people have the release of the version 2.3 ksh that # has this undocumented feature, but it is not supported in 2.3. You can # look for it in the next version of the MKS Toolkit. I wanted to make # sure that people were aware of this fact in case they tried to do it and # couldn't because they probably can't do it yet. But soon... ^^^^ When will the new version be available? If I purchase the toolkit now (and it sounds tempting), what's the upgrade policy? # Andy Toy, Mortice Kern Systems Inc., Internet: andy%mks@watmath.UWaterloo.ca # 35 King Street North, Waterloo, UUCP: uunet!watmath!mks!andy # Ontario, CANADA N2J 2W9 Phone: 519/884-2251 FAX: 519/884-8861 -------------------------------------------------------- Dan Poirier UNC Chapel Hill poirier@cs.unc.edu
vu0112@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu (Cliff Joslyn) (06/02/89)
In article <1010@mks.UUCP> andy@mks.UUCP (Andy Toy) writes: >This is NOT a feature of the Korn Shell (sh.exe) in the MKS Toolkit >version 2.3. Some people have the release of the version 2.3 ksh that >has this undocumented feature, but it is not supported in 2.3. Be a nice guy: tell us how, just in case! >You can >look for it in the next version of the MKS Toolkit. When's that available? >I wanted to make >sure that people were aware of this fact in case they tried to do it and >couldn't because they probably can't do it yet. But soon... I promise not to tell anyone else. . . ;-> >Andy Toy, Mortice Kern Systems Inc., Internet: andy%mks@watmath.UWaterloo.ca -- O----------------------------------------------------------------------> | Cliff Joslyn, Cybernetician at Large | Systems Science, SUNY Binghamton, vu0112@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu V All the world is biscuit shaped. . .