Extended Command Processor 8 ============================ Copyright 1987 by Don Elton Carolina System Software 2916-A Chatsworth Road Columbia, SC 29223 (803) 788-7360 This is the electronic version of the Extended Command Processor 8 (ECP-8) for ProDOS. This is a shareware combination operating system shell, program selector, and utility package for any Apple II computer that can run ProDOS. The electronic version is a subset of the full program package in that several utilities, commands, and features are missing from this package. There is still pleny of usefulness to be gained from this limited version though. It is my hope that you'll like what you see and send in the paltry $30 registration fee to receive the full package along with over 50 pages of in-depth documentation in the form of a user's guide for the non-programmer as well as a technical reference for the assembly language or C programmer who would like to extends further the capabilities of this already powerful package. Registered ECP-8 owners will tell you that it is worth your while to register so you can receive the frequent update notices when new features are added to this package. Most of these new features are added as a direct result of user suggestions/requests so I want to hear from you if you have ideas of how the package might be improved. If you don't find the program useful then just erase the files and respect this shareware agreement by not using the software. The only way I'll continue to write programs like this for shareware distribution is if users support the effort. You'll do yourself and all of us a favor if you support shareware software authors of programs you use. If this program were being marketed on the retail level it would cost you at least $80 or so if not more based on comparisons with commercial competitors. Because ECP-8 is a large software package you'll need to spend a few minutes putting the package together on your disk. First off, a word about program selectors. A program selector is a special type of ProDOS program that is used to select or start application programs such as your word processor or terminal program. When you use the QUIT option from most ProDOS programs you ordinarily reach an unfriendly screen that asks you for a prefix of the next application. When a program selector is installed you are brought back to the selector program automatically when you leave a ProDOS system program. This way you no longer reboot your computer in frustration to switch between your various application programs. For this scheme to work correctly, the program selector itself (in this case ECP8.SYSTEM) should be the first "system" program to be executed when you boot your computer. You can assure that this will be the case by making sure that the file ECP8.SYSTEM is the first file to be listed in the catalog of your boot disk. You may need to do some renaming and file copying (using FILER until you're more familiar with ECP-8) to accomplish this. ECP-8 will look for two special subdirectories when it boots up. The first is a directory named HELP. The HELP subdirectory should be listed in the same directory as ECP8.SYSTEM. When you type the command HELP at the ECP-8 prompt ":" then ECP-8 will search the HELP subdirectory for a text file named and will display it to the screen. The HELP subdirectory is optional. If you don't have room for it or don't need it then don't create it and ECP-8 will just disable the HELP command no questions asked. The other special subdirectory is the CMDS subdirectory. This is a very useful (though still not required) subdirectory. It too should reside in the same directory that ECP8.SYSTEM is found in. When you type a command that isn't a built-in command to ECP-8 it will first search for a file by that name in the directory that the ProDOS prefix is set to. If it doesn't find the file there it will look for the file in the CMDS subdirectory. This means that you can put ECP-8 external commands, batch programs, or your own basic, assembler, c or other utilities in this directory and never again have to remember where you put them on your disk. ECP-8 always knows to look for any file in the CMDS subdirectory if it can't find it in the current prefix directory. To set up ECP-8 you should extract all of the members from the Binary II file you downloaded onto a blank diskette. You will have to use the Apple Library Utility (ALU) to do this. It is available separately for downloading here on MAUG. The following files are contained in ECP8.BNY: ECP8.SYSTEM - the main ECP-8 system program CP.STARTUP - an auto-start batch file for ECP-8 READ.ME - any last minute notices are included here CMDS.BNY - several ECP-8 external commands are stored here The contents of this BNY file should be placed in your "CMDS" subdirectory described above. There's one standard ECP-8 external command not supplied in this file that you already have a copy of. You should move your copy of BASIC.SYSTEM into the "CMDS" subdirectory and then rename it as simply "BASIC". Then delete the original BASIC.SYSTEM off your boot directory if it was there as ECP8.SYSTEM should now be your default system program. HELP.BQY - this contains help files to be placed in the "HELP" subdirectory described above. This is a SQUEEZED Binary II file. Use the ECP command USQ to unsqueeze this file. Just type "usq help.bqy" and the unsqueezed Binary II file will be written to your disk. Then use a utility such as ALU, BLU, or Binary.Dwn to unpack the Binary II file into your HELP subdirectory. USQ is an external command that you will find in CMDS.BNY so unpack CMDS.BNY first. Brief pointers on how to use ECP-8: ---------------------------------- Read the help files.. they explain how to use most of the commands both built-in to ECP-8 and several of the external commands. If you see help for a command not included in this electronic version they are included with the full version. There are also commands included in the full version that do not have help files included with this electronic version of ECP-8. To set a prefix just type the name of the directory. To back up a prefix directory level just enter the "\" command. To run a basic program just enter its name. So long as you have the file BASIC in your "CMDS" subdirectory (and it's really a renamed BASIC.SYSTEM) ECP-8 will run your basic program for you via BASIC. To run a system program, binary program, or batch program, or external command just type its name (see the pattern here?) ECP-8 will look at anything you type and try to find a built-in command by that name. If it's not built-in ECP-8 checks the PREFIX and then the CMDS directories for a file of that name. If the file is a directory the PREFIX is set there. If it's an executable file ECP-8 will try to run it. Have fun and don't forget to mail in your check today for the latest version of the software, the full utility package, a user's guide, the technical reference guide, update notices, and a real warm feeling inside for keeping low cost Apple software on the market. -Don Elton P.S. You may have noticed that this package is called ECP *8*. This is because ProDOS 8 is the base operating system for the package (and is included for registered users) and because there's now a 16-bit version of ECP called ECP-16 that runs under ProDOS 16. ECP-16 is also a shareware program that sells for $40 (and includes ECP-8 as a part of the package).