DOS ENHANCOne of the complaints about the AOperating System (DOS) is that it is toodrive was first introduced, it was a tremover cassette reading and writing. But wicomputer systems available today, ApplJson, indeed too slow. However, some elmade to DOS to speed up certain operamost of these enhancements were reccause suddenly DOS speed up prograrriover. We will look at six (one is a preliJthis issue and will review more in futureIn evaluating these DOS enhancers hused. The first is speed of operation, alease of use of the program to create a fdof the programs reviewed here impr(RUN/BRUN) times only with no effectTAKE ADVANTAGE OF THISSPECIAL OFFER(See Cards Below - Offer Expires 1April<strong>1983</strong>)Use this Toll-Free Number For MasterCard and Visa Orders1-800-345-81121-800-662-2444 (Pennsylvania only)BUSINESS REPLY MAILFIRST CLASS PERMIT NO. 385 LAS CRUCES, N.M.NO POSTAGENECESSARYIF MAILEDIN THEUNITED STATESPOSTAGE WILL BE PAID BY ADDRESSEEHyper-DOSby John BridgesSoftkey Publishing(Hardcore Computing)P.O. Box 44549Tacoma, WA 98444206-581-6038Machine Language48K, FP (see text)DOS 3.3UnlockedRating: B-Reviewed by Monty Lee2260 OleanderLas Cruces, New Mexico 88001BUSINESS REPLY MAILFIRST CLASS PERMIT NO. 385 LAS CRUCES, N.M.POSTAGE WILL BE PAID BY ADDRESSEENO POSTAGENECESSARYIF MAILEDIN THEUNITED STATESHyperDOS is distributed by Softkey Publishthe HARDCORE magazine. The HyperDOS IiVol. 1 Issue 3 to all HARDCORE subscribers. Isubscribe to HARDCORE, HyperDOS is avdirectly. According to Softkey, the ~nly differeproducts is that the $19.95 HyperDOS will worfiles also, and the magazine one will not.The program itself occupies 256 bytes startiSince this is just below the normal DOS buffer5182260 OleanderLas Cruces, New Mexico 88001
Diversi-DOSBill BashamDiversified Software Research, Inc.5848 Crampton Ct.Rockford, IL 61111815-877-1343$30.00Applesoft BASIC and Mach. Lang.48K, FP, optional RAM cardDOS 3.3UnlockedRating: A -Reviewed by Monty LeeDiversi-DOS was distributed by one of the most unique methodsto date. It was mailed free to all International Apple Core clubs forthem to distribute to their members. Even booting the disk gives youa page telling you to feel free to copy the disk and give to your friends.The catch is that if you decide you like Diversi-DOS and want to incorporateit on all your disks you must send the company $30 (increasedfrom the original $25). Until then, you must display the "requestfor payment message" on all disks. Once registered you will receivea patch to remove this screen display.Diversi-DOS does significantly increase the speed of DOS.Diversi-DOS also improves SA VEs and text file access - somethingthat many of the other enhancers do not. The instructions providedwith Diversi-DOS are all on the disk. You can print these out either tothe screen or to your printer. Unfortunately, the print out is only 40column so to print out the entire set will take about 20 pages.Furthermore, the instruction set resides in memory, and not a textfile, thus you cannot load it into a word processor to print out. Itwould have been better for Diversified Software to provide the instructionset suitable for an 80 column printout in a text file.The instructions are fairly complete, but lack enough detail. Tosuccessfully use all the features of Diversi-DOS will take some experimentationand rereading the documentation. One nice feature is thatinformation is provided for advanced programmers on how to changesome of the features of Diversi-DOS. Some of these features includeadding different printer cards, handling interrupts; RESET hooking,and POKEs so that a data disk can be IN!Tialized with no DOS on it.This information is very valuable.One thing lacking in the documentation is a more detailed explanationof what areas of DOS were changed. I'm not asking for thesource code of the changes, just the areas. For those who haveworked with DOS and made many changes to it, a significantlymodified DOS like Diversi-DOS will usually overwrite your manychanges. I think it is up to the company to provide some informationon unused areas for user patching, commands not affected, and locationsof DOS not modified. This makes it considerably easier for theuser to insert his own patches. For example, a common patch to nor-Volume 4, Number 1, <strong>1983</strong>ma! DOS is one to avoid reload of the language card. Diversi-DOSdoes not tell you if the area for the patch is modified or not.As for the speed enhancements, Diversi-DOS was one of thefastest we tested. It also improves file SAVE times, but does so at theexpense of the VERIFY function performed by normal DOS. Thus ifyou want to insure a successful SAVE you must re-install theVERIFY feature and this will slow down the SAVE times.Diversi-DOS is the only program to improve text file access.Sequential text file reading/writing is significantly improved as indicatedin the chart below. Additionally, Diversi-DOS will work withPie Writer and improve the reading/writing of both TEXT andBINARY files . The speed improvement with the BINARY files is reallynoticeable. Furthermore, Diversi-DOS provides a routine that willimprove random access file reading/writing through the use of aCALL Testing of this feature revealed generally a 20 second improvementin writing random access files regardless of file size (ifgreater than 100 records) and a 30% speed improvement in READingrandom access files regardless of size. This test was done on filesranging from 100 records to 1000 (20 to 110 sectors).• • • WARNING • • • The !AC distributed version of DiversiDOS, version 1-A, has a bug in it that will NOT correctly READ thenWRITE or APPEND text files. Users must send in $5 for the update(in addition to the $25 license fee).As if the above were not enough, Diversi-DOS also includes akeyboard and print buffer using the RAM card. These features arenot part of DOS, but are instead, a separate binary file that you mustBRUN. The buffer assumes a 16K card in slot #0 and a parallelprinter card in slot #1. If you do not have this standard arrangement,instructions are provided to make the necessary modifications.The keyboard buffer will allow you to type while the computer isdoing other things like reading the disk. As the instructions point out,since this feature is done entirely in software, some programs will notbe compatible. If a program reads the keyboard strobe (uses PEEKsinstead of INPUT or GET) it will not work. There are other instanceswhere it will not work. For example, if you LIST a program, you canno longer scroll the listing with CTRL S or stop it with CTRL C sincethe Apple uses the keyboard strobe for these features .The printer buffer is installed at the same time as the keyboardbuffer. All output to the printer (when PR#l is used) is routed to theRAM card for buffering and then to the printer card. Unfortunately,the print buffer disables the features on the printer card, so your outputmay not be what you expected. Generally, I found the bufferfeature for both the keyboard and printer not worth the problems. Alot of programs won't work with the keyboard buffer, and there's noeasy way to turn it on and off. The output from the printer buffer israrely formatted the way it would be without using the buffer.In summary, Diversi-DOS provides a lot of nice features. A moredetailed explanation of the changes and better documentation (and abetter way to print it) would significantly improve this product evenmore. Generally I found that many programs that work with normalDOS will work with Diversi-DOS. The improvement in speed for allof the disk access commands, from SAVE to READ, make DiversiDOS a complete package. One major drawback to Diversi-DOS isthat all DOS error messages have been replaced by DOS ERROR#XX so that you will have to look up the code for XX to see what errorhas occurred.D19
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