7. Appendix

7.1 Windows 9x Winboot.Ini file

[PATHS]	Description
WinDir=	Windows 95 directory (e.g. C:\WINDOWS)
WinBootDir=	Windows boot directory
HostWinBootDrv=	Windows boot drive
UninstallDir=	Uninstall directory

Example WINBOOT.INI file:

;
; Example WINBOOT.INI file from MATTsoft Boot Manager
;

[Paths]
WinDir=C:\WINDOWS

[Options]
BootMenu=1
BootMulti=1
BootWin=1
BootGui=1
BootKeys=1

;xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
;xxxxxxxxxxxxx WINBOOT.INI must be > than 1024 bytes  xxxxxxxxxxxx
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7.3 OpenDOS/DR-DOS boot menu

Creating menus in CONFIG.SYS (or DCONFIG.SYS) is very simple. Labels are marked with ":" character before label name (e.g. :my_label). Command GOTO [label jumps to specified label and GOSUB [label] calls [label] as subroutine. Then you must exit subroutine with RETURN command. Command SWITCH [label1][,label2[,label3[,...]]] asks user for choice and jumps to entered label. Swictch command waits for number (1,2,3,...) and jumps to n-th specified label (key '3'=label3 in our example). You can use also CLS to clear screen, ECHO text to display some text (e.g. menu) and TIMEOUT [n] to set SWITCH timeout in seconds. Look at this example:

rem === menu ===
cls
timeout 2
echo   DCONFIG.SYS Startup Menu
echo   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
echo
echo   1. Normal config
echo   2. TaskMgr
echo   3. Free
echo
echo Press 1 or 2...
switch o_normal,o_tasker,o_free

rem === common ===
Lastdrive=Z

rem === normal ===
:o_normal
device=c:\utils\cdrom\mtmcdai.sys /D:MTMIDE01
set CONFIG=O_normal

rem === free ===
:o_free
set CONFIG=O_Free
return

rem tasker ===
:o_tasker
device=c:\utils\cdrom\mtmcdai.sys /D:MTMIDE01
set CONFIG=O_Tasker
return

You must also modify your autoexec.bat file to jump to right place (GOTO %CONFIG%). Small example:

@echo off
rem === common ===
set path=c:\vc;c:\batch;c:\utils;..
goto %CONFIG%

:o_free
goto quit

:o_tasker
c:\opendos\share.exe
c:\opendos\taskmgr.exe
c:\vc\vc.com
goto quit

:o_normal
c:\vc\vc.com
goto quit

:quit

7.4 DOS fdisk arguments

7.5 Filesystems

7.6 Partitioning your disk

DOS/Win 9x FAT16 filesystem:

Disk size	Cluster size
0 - 127 MB	2 KB
128 - 255 MB	4 KB
256 - 511 MB	8 KB
512 - 1023 MB	16 KB
1024 - 2047 MB	32 KB

Note: FAT16 partition cannot be larger than 2048 MB (2 GB). You must use FAT32 or divide disk.

7.7 Other programs

7.7.1 Other boot managers

• System commander
  Info: http://www.v-com.com
  This is a commercial boot manager. It's user interface is simmilar to MATTsoft Boot Manager's (or vice versa? ;-).
• PTS Boot Wizard
  Homepage: http://www.phystechsoft.com/.
  Nice shareware ( $20 ) bootmanager. Allows you to have up to 100 OSes (do you really need all of them?). Knows all the necessary data (what and where they write, what files they use for configuration) about most common ones. You will be able to install few OSes into one partition (the program will keep all configuration and system files intouched, even if you install few DOSes).
• OS-BS
  Homepage: http://www.prz.tu-berlin.de/~wolf/os-bs.html
  This is a good boot manager.Note that it has been in beta for years, but it is quite stable.
• YAPboot
  Download: ftp://ftp.ee.und.ac.za/pub/msdos/yapboo10.zip
  This is the "Yet Another Partition Sector Boot Program" editor and simple boot manager.

7.7.2 Other partition editors/fdisks

• Ranish partition manager
  Homepage: http://www.intercom.com/~ranish/part/.
  Quite powerful program for dealing with partitions of your hard drive. Allows to save MBR in a file and restore from it, change partition size, format them, check the disk's surface, create up to 31 primary partitions on a disk, etc. Includes boot manager. Source code included.

7.7.3 Misc programs

• FIPS
  Download: http://sunsite.unc.edu/pub/Linux/system/install/fips15.zip
  This programs shrinks MS-DOS FAT partitions. It's GNU program, source code included.
• Partition Magic
  Info: http://www.powerquest.com
  This is a commercial program. It can resize MS-DOS FAT16/32 partitions and manage other filesystems.

7.8 Operating systems

• AIX
  This is abbreviation for "Advanced Interactive Executive", IBM's Unix[R] for RS/6000 machines. Intel (x86) version also exists but is no more developed. For more information see http://rs6000.ibm.com.
• BeOS
  I haven't seen this system yet. For more info see Be's webpage at www.be.com. If you are using it or you have some interresting informations let me know.
• BSDI
  BSDI is commercial BSD unix developed by BSDI Inc. More info at http://www.bsdi.com.
• Caldera OpenDOS (aka DR-DOS)
  This DOS is free for non-commercial purposes. You can download it at www.caldera.com. Kernel source is also available at the same site. Check it out!
• FreeBSD
  FreeBSD is very good BSD unix. It's only for Intel i386 platform. Distribution CD-ROMs (you can buy them at Walnut Creek or download) contains many programs including development tools, databases, cad, biology, games, ... For more informations look at http://www.freebsd.org.
• FreeDOS
  
• Hurd (GNU HURD)
  Hurd is GNU Mach microkernel-based Unix. For more informations see GNU Hurd homepage at http://www.gnu.org/hurd/.
• Linux
  
• LynxOS
  LynxOS is real-time operating system.
• Minix
  Minix is a small microkernel Unix from Dr. A. Tanenbaum. It's available free from ftp://ftp.cs.vu.nl. It runs on PC XT or on PC AT 286+ (protected mode version).
• MS-DOS
  This is most common DOS. Microsoft doesn't sell and support it, but you can use DOS 7 from Windows 9x - or OpenDOS ;-)
• NetBSD
  
• Novell NetWare
  
• OpenBSD
  
• OS/2
  OS/2 is a good alternative to Windows 95.
• Plan 9
  Plan 9 from Bell Labs is unix-alike operating system. It's development was stopped, developers are working on another interresting project ;-)
• QNX
  is commercial real-time operating system from QSSL. You can download bootable demodisk (including GUI, ppp and browser with HTML 3.2 and Javascript support) from http://www.qnx.com.
• SCO Unix (aka SCO OpenServer)
  SCO OpenServer is commercial Unix for x86. You can get "Free non-commercial version" from SCO at low cost.
• Solaris
  Solaris (sometimes "slowaris" ;-) is commercial System V Unix from Sun Microsystems. It's available for Intel i386 and Sparc. You can buy "solaris for free" at low cost (In CZ it's about 13 USD).
• UnixWare (SCO UnixWare)
  UnixWare is IMHO very good x86 Unix system from SCO (They bought it from Novell Inc.). You can get "Free non-commercial version" from SCO (like SCO OpenServer).
• Windows 95 and Windows 98
  Does this system need any comment?
• Windows NT