Table Of Content'"
I
Computing
Fundamentals
PC-DOS &
MS-DOS®
CraigA. Wood
Stephen F. Austin State University,
Nacogdoches, Texas
-yli.-y Addison-Wesley Publishing Company
Reading, Massachusetts. Menlo Park, California. New York
Don Mills, Ontario. Wokingham, England. Amsterdam. Bonn
Sydney. Singapore. Tokyo. Madrid. San Juan
This book was produced by the Addison-Wesley Electronic Produc
tion Department on an Apple Macintosh II with PageMaker. The
output was generated on an Apple LaserWriter II NTX.
This book is in the Addison-Wesley Computing Fundamentals
Series.
Series Editor: William S. Davis
MS-DOS is a registered trademark of Microsoft Corporation.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wood, Craig A.
Computing Fundamentals: PC-DOS & MS-DOS / by Craig A.
Wood.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-201-19822-3
1. PC DOS (Computer operating system) 2. MS-DOS (Computer
operating system) 1. Title.
QA76.76.063W656 1990
005.4'46--dc20 89-34550
ClP
Reprinted with corrections June, 1990.
Copyright © 1990 by Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any
means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or other
wise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Printed
in the United States of America.
EFGHIJ-AL-943210
The Computing
F'undamentals
Series
The books in Addison-Wesley's Computing Fundamentals
Series feature tutorials that teach the reader how to use
specific software packages. Their low selling price makes
them attractive as self-teaching aids and as supplements to
a primary text. A unique feature entitled ''What can go
wrong?" anticipates problems, suggests a cause, and helps
the reader recover. The modular nature of the series should
prove attractive to the instuctor of a microcomputer appli
cations course. Current and planned titles include:
AutoCAD®
Microsoft® Word
Concepts, Second Edition
PageMaker®
dBASE III PLUSTM
PC-DOS and MS-DOS®
dBASEJVTM UNIX®
Lotus® 1-2-3® WordPerfect 5.0®
I
iii
Dedicated
To my family Ellen, Deron, and Ryan who make it all worthwhile.
To my parents Nelson and Louise Wood who have been a great inspiration
tome.
To my brothers Britton and Loren who have shared a lifetime of friendship
with me.
iv
Preface
Computing Fundamentals: PC-DOS & MS-DOS is a part of
Addison-Wesley'S Computing Fundamentals Series. Its
purpose is to teach you DOS for use on your personal
computer and to provide you with a reference guide to DOS
commands and procedures. Except for some familiarity
with a keyboard, this book assumes no prior experience
with a personal computer.
Computing Fundamentals: PC-DOS & MS-DOS will
help you to become a more effective personal computer
user. It provides you with a summary of commonly used
DOS commands and procedures. It is designed to assist you
in performing DOS tasks such as preparing disks, viewing
information on disks, and manipulating files of inform a
tion.
Like other books in this series, Computing Fundamen
tals: PC-DOS & MS-DOS is organized as a set of tutorials.
Tutorials often assume that the reader will follow the
instructions perfectly and that nothing will go wrong. Such
assumptions are unrealistic; in the real world, something
always seems to go wrong, and nothing is more frustrating
to a beginner than hitting a dead end. Appearing through
out this book is a unique feature entitled "What Can Go
Wrong?" that anticipates problems, suggests a cause, and
shows how to recover. You should find this feature very
useful. In addition, this book contains a summary, self-test
questions, and exercises at the end of each chapter to help
reinforce the concepts and procedures covered in the
chapter.
I
v
The information contained in this book is based upon the contents of PC
DOS & MS-DOS: A Ready Reference Manual. However, the presentation of
DOS commands and procedures and the items indicated above are unique to
this book. Some material in the first two sections ("What Is a Computer
System?" and "Communicating with a Computer System") of Chapter 1 is
adapted (with permission) from Chapter 6 of Computing Fundamentals:
Concepts (Second Edition) by William S. Davis.
Equipment Utilized
The material presented in this book covers all versions of IBM PC
DOS and MS-DOS. While the research for this book was done on a variety of
personal computers, including IBM, Texas Instruments, Compaq, and Zenith
personal computers, the procedures outlined in this book were performed on
an IBM PC AT using IBM PC-DOS Version 3.30. The IBM PC AT contained
one megabyte ofmemory, a 1.2MB diskette drive (drive A), a 360KB diskette
drive (drive B), and a 30MB hard disk drive (drive C). PC-DOS and MS-DOS
Versions 2.10, 2.13, 3.20, and 3.30 were used in the development ofthe
material in Appendix B.
Acknowledgments
I prepared this manuscript using WordPerfect. The finished text,
including most ofthe art, was produced with PageMaker. For the develop
ment ofthis book lowe much to the individuals who influenced the writing of
PC-DOS & MS-DOS: A Ready Reference Manual. These individuals include:
Warren J. Boe, University ofIowa; Orlynn R. Evans, Stephen F. Austin State
University; Catherine Garrison, The Softwerks; Robert M. Goldhamer,
National Education Corporation; Fred C. Homeyer, Angelo State University;
Deborah R. Lafferty; Karen E. Leath; Richard L. Robertson, Stephen F.
Austin State University; Arthur A Strunk; and Sharon A Williams.
I thank the following individuals, who reviewed this manuscript and
provided helpful comments and suggestions: David Hata of Portland Commu
nity College and Deborah R.. Lafferty ofAddison-Wesley. I thank Orlynn R.
Evans and Richard L. Robertson, computer science faculty members at
Stephen F. Austin State University, for their comments and technical assis
tance". I thank Paul R. Blackwell at Stephen F. Austin State University for
his assistance in drawing Fig. 3.2. I also thank Karen E. Leath for her assis
tan'ce in the manuscript preparation and for her comments and suggestions·
r~sulting from her review ofthis manuscript.
Special thanks go to my editor Keith Wollman, who provided me with
valuable support and direction during the writing ofthis book. Thanks Keith.
Craig A Wood
Texas
1Vacogdoche~
vi
Contents
Preface v
1 Introduction to DOS 1
What Is a Computer System? 1
Hardware and Software 1
Communicating with a Computer System 3
The Keyboard for a Personal Computer 4
Issuing Commands to the Operating System 4
What Is DOS? 6
What Are DOS Commands? 6
Parts of DOS 6
DOS System Files 7
Internal DOS Commands 7
External DOS Commands 7
DOS Utility Programs 7
Batch Commands 8
DOS System Diskette 8
Disk Drives for a Personal Computer 8
Entering DOS Commands 9
Disk Files and Naming 10
Naming a Disk File 10
File Naming Conventions 10
Wildcard (Global) File Name Characters 10
I
vii
User (Visible) Files arid Hidden Files 11
Types of User (Visible) Files 11
DOS Device Names 12
2 Starting(Booting) DOS 14
Booting the Operating System 15
Booting the System from a Diskette 15
Booting the System from a Hard Disk 18
Checking and Changing the System Date (DATE) 20
Checking and Changing the System Time (TIME) 21
Changing the Current (Default) Disk Drive (d:) 22
Clearing the Screen (CLS) 23
Different Versions ofDOS 23
Determining the DOS Version (VER) 24
Printing Information Displayed on the Screen 24
Turning the Printer Echo Mode On and Off 25
Logging Off DOS 25
3 Preparing aNew Disk for Use 28
Formatting a Disk 28
Characteristics of Unformatted and Formatted Disks 29
Results of the FORMAT Command 32
Preparing Data Diskettes (FORMAT) 33
Preparing Bootable Diskettes (FORMAT IS) 36
Transferring DOS to a Formatted Diskette (SYS) 38
Formatting a Diskette with a Volume Label (FORMAT N) 40
4 Displaying Information about a Diskette or Disk 44
Displaying the Table of Contents (Directory Information) of a
Disk 44
Displaying Complete Directory Information (DIR) 45
Pausing after Each Screen Image (DIR IP) 47
Displaying Abbreviated Directory Information (DIR IW) 48
Displaying Directory Information for Selected Files 49
Sending Directory Information to the Printer (DIR > PRN) 53
Checking a DiskettelDisk (CHKDSK) 54
Using CHKDSK to Display Summary Information About a Disk
and Memory 55
Using CHKDSK to Display Hidden and User File Names 57
DiskettelDisk Volume Label 59
Displaying a Volume Label (VOL) 59
Assigning, Changing, and Removing a Volume Label (LABEL) 60
viii
5 Manipulating Files and File Characteristics 66
Copying One User File (COPY) 66
Copying One User File to the Same Disk, Different Filename
and/or Extension 67
Copying One User File to a Second Disk 70
Copying Selected User Files (COPy) 73
Removing (Deleting, Erasing) File Names from a Disk's Directory
(DEL, ERASE) 77
Removing One User File Name from a Disk's Directory 77
Removing Selected User File Names from a Disk's Directory 79
Changing File Names (RENAME) 85
Protecting Files from Accidental Deletion 88
Changing the Read-Only File Access Attribute (ATTRIB) 89
6 Backing Up Diskettes and Files 94
Backup Copies of Files and Diskettes 94
Making Identical Diskette Copies (DISKCOPy) 95
Disadvantages of Using the DISKCOPY Command 97
Backing Up Files Using Two Diskette Drives 97
Backing Up Files with the COpy Command 98
Backing Up Files with the XCOPY Command (Interactive
Selection) 98
Backing Up Files with the XCOPY Command (Dated
Selection) 99
Comparing the Contents of Files (COMP) 100
7 Creating and Viewing Text Files 102
Text Files 102
Creating Text Files 103
Creating a Text File Using the Output Redirection Operator 103
Creating a Text File with the COpy CON Command 104
Displaying Information iri a Text File (TYPE) 105
Printing the Contents of a Text File (PRINT) 106
Sending the Contents of a Text File to the Printer 106
Copying Text Files to the Printer (COpy filespec PRN) 107
Redirecting the Contents of a Text File to the Printer
(TYPE filespec> PRN) 107
8 Using a Hard Disk 111
Background Information 112
Managing Disk Files 112
I
ix
Types of Directories 113
Root Directory 113
Subdirectories 113
Naming Subdirectories 113
Current Directory 113
Directory Path 114
Path Name Notation 114
Directory Structure Terminology 115
Subdirectory Commands 115
Creating (Making) Subdirectories (MKDIR, MD) 116
Creating Subdirectories in the Root Directory (First Level) 116
Creating Second-Level Subdirectories from the Root
Directory 117
Changing the Current Directory (CHDIR, CD) 120
Changing the Current Directory to a Subdirectory of the Current
Directory 120
Changing the Current Directory to the Root Directory 121
Displaying the Current Directory of a Drive 121
Changing the Current Directory with a Path from the Root
Directory 123
Creating Subdirectories of the Current Directory 124
Automatically Displaying the Current Directory Name with
PROMPT 125
Copying Files Between Different Directories 126
Copying Files from the Root Directory to a Subdirectory 126
Copying Files from One Subdirectory to Another
Subdirectory 127
Displaying Information in a Directory Structure 128
Setting an Extended Search Path for DOS to Locate Commands
(PATH) 128
Deleting (Removing) Subdirectories (RMDIR, RD) 132
9 Customizing a System Using Batch Files 137
What Is a Batch .File? 137
The AUTOEXEC.BAT File 138
AUTOEXEC.BAT for an Application Program Diskette 138
AUTOEXEC.BAT for a Hard Disk 139
Modifying a Batch File with EDLIN 140
Appendix A DOS Command Notation and Special Keys 143
Table A1 Notation Used in Describing DOS Commands 143
Table A2 Terms Used in Describing DOS Commands 144
Table A3 Special DOS Control Keys 146
Table A4 DOS Editing and Function Keys 147
x
