VOICE Home Page: http://www.os2voice.org

[Newsletter Index] [Previous Page] [Next Page] [Features Index]

OS/2 Tips

Editor's note: these tips are from OS/2 users and in some cases can not be verified by myself. Please heed this as a warning that if you are not sure about something, don't do it.

and while you're deleting accumulated temp files, don't forget to look in \MMOS2\INETTEMP.

This snippet from my STARTUP.CMD:
....
@del \tcpip\tmp\*.gif
@echo y|del F:\netscape\cache\*
@del F:\netscape\cookies.txt
@copy D:\netscape\users\jonz\cookies.sav D:\netscape\users\jonz\cookies.txt
@del D:\netscape\users\jonz\netscape.hst
@echo y|del D:\netscape\users\jonz\cache\*
....

The D:\NETSCAPE is 4.61 , the F:\NETSCAPE is 2.02 As you can see, I 'manage' my own cookies. Maybe this can give you some ideas.

A general remark for everyboby who gets a trap!

Don't just hit the reset button and hope it won't come back, try and trace a trap! One of the most helpfull hints is this! When a trap occurs write down the CSLIM value. Is it FFFFFFFF? never mind then just hit reset... Is CLSIM != FFFFFFFF? then you can be lucky!

After a reboot (if possible) go onto the internet and download this tool:

ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/util/disk/exeinfo.zip (only 22kB).

This is the manual:

Exeinfo searches your partitions for executable code (device drivers, file systems, EXEs, DLLs) that matches some criteria. To locate the module that caused a trap, write down the CSLIM value that is reported. Then run "exeinfo -f -lxxxx c:\*.*" where xxxx is the CSLIM value and C: should be replaced by each driver from which code may have been loaded.

If, for example, you get CSLIM=0000f113 and all your code is loaded from the D drive because you have multiboot, type

exeinfo -f -lf113 d:\*.*

Another hint for fixpak 13 users and higher, got a Teles ISDN card! Rem out this line:
DEVICE=D:\CAPI\VCAPI.SYS D:\CAPI
That driver is not that good with the WSeB kernel..... it's not a fault in the kernel; the device driver has been written badly....

Also when you have an application that causes a trap. Its useless to uninstall the app and reinstall. All apps are ring 3 code (they don't run on kernel level!) Usually its a sound driver or video driver. Switch to standard VGA or change resolution. Turn off sound, this way you can in many cases locate the problem!

Roderick Klein

Several past messages concerned this card and the problems it had working under OS/2 (it didn't work with the supplied drivers). I found that under Linux my card (which has version 4.1 printed on it) was identified as an ADMtek Centaur series. After a bit of hunting I got to the ADMtek site (http://www.admtek.com.tw). Under products, Centaur series, AN 983 chip you can find a bunch of driver diskettes. Download the one for fast ethernet v 1.06 (a standard zip file). Unzip it (creates directory fastnic.106 with various subdirectories. NDIS\OS2 is the one you want) and point the MTPS adapter card update (or "other adapters...") to the ....\NDIS\OS2 subdirectory. The card will then appear in the list as a "PCI 10/100 fast ..."). When the drivers were copied over to the \IBMCOM directory, the nif file (fastnic.nif) in \IBMCOM\MACS had to be edited to show the correct path (\IBMCOM\MACS instead of \NDIS\OS2). Follow the rest of the MTPS instructions abd reboot. The new driver should now find the card and you're set

I've had some success with the 3Com USB modem. My current system has no physical COM ports assigned. I am using a SCM internal 2-bay PCMCIA unit so that I can access CompactFlash cards from a digital camera via PCMCIA adapter, but I do not use a PCMCIA modem or network card. I do have a 3Com ISA network adapter though.

Now...some tips. There is an undocumented switch in the USBCOM driver to specify which port it uses. I've currently got it assigned to COM1....here is the relevent info from my CONFIG.SYS:

REM ----------------------------
REM *** COM, USB, PCMCIA DRIVERS
REM ----------------------------
BASEDEV=PCMCIA.SYS /P
BASEDEV=PCM2ATA.ADD /S:1 /!DM /NOBEEP
DEVICE=C:\OS2\MDOS\VPCMCIA.SYS
BASEDEV=USBUHCD.SYS /V
BASEDEV=USBD.SYS /REQ:USBUHCD$
BASEDEV=USBHID.SYS /V
DEVICE=C:\OS2\BOOT\USBCOM.SYS /V /N:COM1
CALL=MODE.COM COM1:115200,N,8,1, DTR=ON
BASEDEV=SS2PCIC1.SYS
DEVICE=C:\OS2\BOOT\PCMSSDIF.SYS
DEVICE=C:\OS2\BOOT\PCM2SRAM.SYS
DEVICE=C:\OS2\BOOT\FLSH2MTD.SYS
DEVICE=C:\OS2\BOOT\PCM2FLSH.SYS
BASEDEV=OS2PCARD.DMD

Note that I do not currently have COM.SYS/VCOM.SYS or the SIO drivers installed. If you need to run the USBCOM port on any other port than COM1 you have to specify it. Say you want COM3 then the switch would be /N:COM3.

Problem is that if you are using more COM ports than just the USBCOM port you can run into conflicts. The Warp included COM.SYS automatically claims ports 1 through 4. To get around this I used the SIO drivers and specified which ports I needed. Check the docs that come with SIO to see how to specify specific COM ports. At one time I had COM1 and 2 through SIO and had the USBCOM port set to COM3 and it all worked. I did away with all that though.

Best suggestion I have at the moment is simplify things and experiment. Try getting the USBCOM port to work. If you need the other physical COM ports, use SIO and specify COM3 for the USBCOM port.

People with this problem should try to set the netmask in the InJoy Dialer to 255.255.255.255 ... I tried and it seems to solve ALL problems, but would like to hear more from others (asap).

There is an option in the \IBMLAN\IBMLAN.INI (of OS/2 Warp 3 Connect or higher at least) where you can set the amount of reported free space to Windows requesters. It is bit 35 of wrkheuristics:

; 35 free disk space reported to DOS and Windows applications
; 0 = return true value (default)
; 1 = return a value less than two gigabytes

Perhaps it can help you here?

Here's a copy of a batch file I call netstart.cmd that was started from startup.cmd on our machines before I applied the fixes to ip08412 here:

-------------------------------------------------------------CUT HERE
@echo off
net start requester
Rem Batch file to setup network connections from \\MACHIN1
Rem -----------------------------------------------------------------
NET USE S: \\UNIXWARE7\PUBLIC
NET USE T: \\UNIXWARE7\TMP
NET USE V: \\MACHIN2\CDRIVE
NET USE W: \\MACHIN2\DDRIVE
NET USE X: \\MACHIN2\EDRIVE
NET USE Y: \\MACHIN2\FDRIVE
NET USE LPT2 \\MACHIN2\LQ570
NET USE COM3 \\MACHIN2\COM1
NET USE COM4 \\MACHIN2\COM2
-------------------------------------------------------------CUT HERE

You will, of course, have to provide your own connection info. Type
'help net' at a command prompt to get more info on the 'net' command.
To start this from startup.cmd I used:

'start "Network Startup" /win /min e:\bin\netstart.cmd >nul'

UNPACK bundle .
unpacks all files to the current directory (Note the "." at the end)

UNPACK bundle /SHOW
shows the files (does not unpack)

UNPACK bundle
puts the files in the correct directories
(dont do this on your boot drive unless you are sure)

Careful with the IBM bundle files. These contain root paths (/OS2/...)
and will try to create file from the root of your current directory

---

Then I remembered the procedure I had to use the last time Winos2 died under the ELSA card. That one worked.

1)Run Selective Uninstall, remove DOS & Windows support.
2)Run Selective install, install VGA driver.
3)Reboot. Run checkini /C /Y:2
4)Reinstall DOS & Windows support.
5)Install new video drivers.

The odd thing about the "Error loading DISPLAY.DRV" is that at no point during the above procedure was there a file named display.drv on the system.

I formerly was with FreeWWWeb, where you could dial in with your own software, then FreeWWWeb was taken over by Juno. Now there is One Nation Online (http://www.1nol.com/central). Some people on the Arachne (http://arachne.cz) e-mailing list use 1nol from DOS. What turned me away was lack of local access in my area, not a single phone number in the state of KY, though there were 25 in RI.

You might of course, choose to click on the Back button, keep it pressed (or use right click) to see the options pop up and select the one that you know didn't forward you here.

Arcinst refreshes the desktop backup data structures.