# Solved: Starting a program in DOS



## duhast (Aug 30, 2004)

I will try to give a quick illustration of my setup.

Older Pentium II, 512mb RAM, 10 gig HDD, partitioned thusly: 500-ishMB C:/DOS FAT16. remainder D:WIN98SE FAT32, 9-ish gigs.

I tried a boot manager, no joy, 98 takes command and boots no matter what, so my workaround is to boot with WIN98 boot disk and go to C:\DOS and run Dosshell. All that is OK, slow, but it gets me what I want.

Here's what's making me nuts (I used to know all this stuff, now I'm just old). I have an old Lavenir CAM installed for work (Computer Assisted Manufacturing). In the past I have run it under WIN98, but it's picky and setup is a PIA. It runs fine in \DOS\Dosshell, BUT only in it's own directory (C:Lavenir) I tried this (C:\Lavenir\Work) and it will not start, (bad command-file name). 

I thought I remembered to put Lavenir in the path and I've done that and still no joy.


@ECHO OFF
PROMPT $p$g
PATH C:\DOS;C:\MOUSE;C:\Lavenir
MOUSE
SET TEMP=C:\DOS


I have even added to the path C;\Lavenir\Work, saved the autoexec and ran it. If push comes to shove, I CAN do the work in the Lav directory, but I don't like mixing work and program files.

Obviously, I've forgotten something...


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

You need to type the executable name. You just can't type the path and expect the executable to launch itself.


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## duhast (Aug 30, 2004)

No joy. There are actually several programs that are part of the CAM, V2001.exe, V2002.BAT (a variant somehow of 2001), and ROUT.EXE.

Here's what I did. 


@ECHO OFF
PROMPT $p$g
PATH C:\DOS;C:\MOUSE;C:\Lavenir\V2002.BAT;C:\Lavenir\Work\V2002.BAT
MOUSE
SET TEMP=C:\DOS


Just to try to get one to work. The 3 files each start inside the Lav directory, but with the changes, even just the V2002.BAT file will not run in \Work.

And to clarify, I don't want these to start on boot. What I've had before (years ago) was to go to the dir that had the work files (\work), shift-F9 to the command line prompt, type the EXE file (either V2001, V2002, or Rout) and the CAM would run that program.


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## UserBarZero (Nov 30, 2011)

Since you are running it natively I guess dosbox (free dos emulator) would be of no use then.
The people who made that focused on games. I don't think they made it for entire drives, or manufacturing programs..

It would be pretty funny if you could boot up XP or 7 and run the program via dosbox lolz

just a tidbit ignore pls if no use to you (sorry lol)


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## duhast (Aug 30, 2004)

No problem. Historically, I have gotten it to run in 98SE, in fact I have a disk now that will run it, but there is just so much weirdness with running under 98. The setup is nuts (I finally wrote it down) I have to do all the PIF settings, but while a program will start, once you get in there are error beeps on some navigation functions, like changing directories to find the file to open. It's almost like under 98, the commands only work a certain "distance" from home (C:\Lavenir) if that makes any sense. Navigate to far out from the directory, and it stops working...


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

I am not sure why you have a partition for DOS and one for Windows 98. This makes no sense. What version of DOS did you load on the first partition?

The reason it makes no sense is because Windows 98 runs on top of DOS 7. You can have your Windows 98 boot into DOS if you want it to. But essentially your DOS program should run just fine inside a DOS Window inside Windows 98.


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## duhast (Aug 30, 2004)

I have 6.22 loaded. I know about win98 and it's DOS, but the CAM is extremely fussy about how it is set up. It really doesn't like that 'layering' of OS or being in a window. I think it has something to do with how DOS memory is allocated.

The good news is that today I got it to the point where it will run in 6.22 outside of it's own directory. I'm just using the boot menus to boot to "previous version DOS". I use dosshell for ease of moving around in dos, and I use 98 for management of my database files. There are somewhere between 35 and 45 thousand of those files, so DOS is right out for that chore...

I'm considering it all a success now.


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

Like I said though. You don't need DOS 6.22 loaded on their when you already have DOS 7. You can setup your computer to boot straight into DOS 7 instead of Windows 98 and then when you want to run Windows 98 you can just type WIN at the dos prompt to launch 98.


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## duhast (Aug 30, 2004)

OK, I see what you mean. I have several more spare drives that I can experiment with. Can you point me to a how-to for that setup? And will dosshell work with DOS 7?


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

http://www.ctyme.com/msdos7.htm


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## duhast (Aug 30, 2004)

Thanks. I will try that.


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## duhast (Aug 30, 2004)

OK, I've had pretty good luck with that DOS 7 trick and I want to pursue it further. The programs run just fine and seem not to have any snags other that right now only running in the \Lavenir directory.

When I run my programs in DOS 6.22, I have to put some things in the autoexec.bat file like this:

path COS;C:\mouse;C:\Lavenir
mouse
dosshell

Under DOS 7, what do I do to get that functionality, that is, getting a mouse, booting to dosshell, and running my programs from \Lavenir across other directories? Also, how to go to DOS 7 so all the drives & CDROM are seen?


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## Squashman (Apr 4, 2003)

Same way you do it in DOS 6.22.


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## duhast (Aug 30, 2004)

I didn't see an autoexec.bat in the root (C:\). I'll look again.

EDIT: I am working on two different setups. I am going to get my head straight and start new threads about each specific item. Right now I have a setup that works very well, but is a bit clunky to start, that will be issue 1. The other is refining DOS 7 to get it to the same high level of usability, that will be issue 2.


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