Directory Maven Version 1.2 Copyright (C) 1994 Kent Briggs All Rights Reserved Purpose ------- maven (MAY vin) n. expert or connoisseur, devotee. Directory Maven is DOS utility program that allows the user to quickly change to another directory across any drive (quick mode option) or to view the directory structure of all drives in a graphical tree format (tree mode option). License ------- Directory Maven is Freeware, i.e. copyrighted software that may be freely distributed and used indefinitely without payment to the author. The only restrictions that apply are that the program files must be distributed together and unmodified, including the documentation files. This software is provided as is and without warranty. The author assumes no liability for damages, either direct or consequential, which may result from the use of this product. Installation ------------ Copy DM.EXE into one of your path directories so that it can be executed from any directory. Type PATH at the DOS command line to see a list of your path directories, each separated by a ";". Edit your AUTOEXEC.BAT file to modify your PATH. DMCONFIG -------- If you have a monochrome monitor, you may need to run DMCONFIG.EXE to change the screen colors from the default color setting to black and white colors only. DMCONFIG will modify DM.EXE with the new color settings. Scan File --------- Directory Maven scans the directories on your drives and stores this list in a file called DM.DAT. By default, DM.DAT will be stored in the same directory as DM.EXE. However, this will cause problems if DM.EXE is on a network drive and being shared by many users. Therefore, Directory Maven will first look for a DOS environment variable called DIRMAVEN that points to the location of DM.DAT. Use the SET command in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file to define an environment variable (e.g. SET DIRMAVEN=C:\GLOBAL). If this variable does not exist then Directory Maven looks for a one-line ASCII text file called DM.CFG in the same directory as DM.EXE. DM.CFG will specify the location of DM.DAT. To create a DM.CFG file that specifies C:\ as the DM.DAT directory, type the following lines at the DOS command line: COPY CON DM.CFG C:\ Finally, if DM.CFG does not exist, then Directory Maven stores DM.DAT in the same directory as DM.EXE. First Time Operation -------------------- Start Directory Maven by typing DM at the DOS command line and press Enter. Press F2. Type in the letters representing the drives you want scanned. Your active drives are shown in black in the upper left corner of the screen. Normally, you would not scan removable media drives such as floppy or CD-ROM drives, although you can if you want to. Press Enter to scan the drives and create the DM.DAT scan file. After scanning, press Esc or Alt-X to exit Directory Maven. Quick Mode Operation -------------------- Use the command line options to operate Directory Maven in Quick Mode. Type DM ? to see all the possible parameters. The parameters are not case sensitive. To quickly change to another directory (even if it is on another drive) enter one of the following commands at the DOS prompt: DM partial_directory_name DM *partial_directory_name where partial_directory_name could be something like "my" when you want to change to a directory that starts with "my" such as "C:\LOTUS\MYFILES". Precede the name with an "*" to find matches within the directory name. For example, "DM file" would not find "C:\LOTUS\MYFILES" but "DM *file" would. Directory Maven will look in DM.DAT for exact and partial matches to "file". If only one match is found, then Directory Maven will change to that directory and exit. If more than one match is found, a pop-up list will be displayed showing all matches. Exact matches will be shown at the top of the list followed by partial matches. Cursor to the one you want and press Enter or press Esc to cancel. Up to 999 matches will appear in the list. Matches on inactive drives (e.g. network drives when not logged in) will not be shown. If you want to restrict the search to one specific drive, then prefix the directory name with a drive letter and colon: DM d:partial_directory_name DM d:*partial_directory_name Scanning Drives --------------- To add new drives or update previously scanned drives in the DM.DAT file, use the following commands: DM /sD DM /s+D where D is the drive list. For example, DM /sCGK will scan drives C, G, and K. Prefix the drive list with a "+" to include hidden directories. Drives previously scanned, but not scanned this time will remain in the scan file unchanged. You may also scan drives in Tree Mode (see below). Adding New Directories To Scan File ----------------------------------- To add a single directory to the DM.DAT scan file without rescanning the entire drive, change to the new directory using the DOS CD command and use the Add switch: DM /a The parent directory of the new directory must already exist in the scan file or the add operation will fail. Tree Mode Operation ------------------- Run Directory Maven in Tree Mode to see a graphical tree representation of your drives. Start DM without any command line parameters to run in Tree Mode. Your active drives are shown in black in the upper left corner of the screen. Previously scanned drives that are currently inactive are shown lower case in gray. Examples of inactive drives might include network drives when you are logged out of the network, RAM drives and CD-ROM drives when the drivers were not loaded during this session, etc. The 43/50 line EGA/VGA modes are supported in Tree Mode. Use the DOS Mode command to set the number of display lines. Example: MODE CON LINES=50 Directory Tree Navigation ------------------------- The directory tree for the current drive will be displayed on start up. The current directory will be shown in yellow (if previously scanned). Use the cursor keys, PageUp/PageDn, and Home/End keys to move through the tree. Hold the shift key down when using the up/down arrow keys to stay in the same tree level. Press the left arrow key to move to the parent of the current directory. When the root directory is highlighted, the date and time the drive was last scanned is shown on the bottom status line. Use the Tab and Shift-Tab keys to move to other drives. Press F1 to display the help screen. Speed Search ------------ To move quickly to a directory (current drive only) in tree mode, begin typing the characters in the name. The cursor will jump to the next match found with each keystroke. The computer will beep if no match is found. Press Alt-N during Speed Search to look for other matches based on the characters you typed in so far. Press Esc or any of the cursor keys to exit Speed Search. Use the backspace key to erase the last Speed Search character. Scanning Drives --------------- Press F2 to rescan one or more drives. If you want to include hidden directories, press Shift-F2 instead. Type in the letters representing the drives to scan. Press Enter to start or Esc to cancel. Only the active drives (shown in black in the upper left corner) can be scanned, up to 999 directories each (memory permitting). Drives previously scanned, but not scanned this time will remain in the scan file unchanged. You may also scan drives from the DOS command line (see above). Removing Drives and Directories ------------------------------- To remove a single directory from the scan file, move the cursor to the directory and press Delete. You cannot remove a directory if it has subdirectories (unless you remove the subdirectories first). To remove a drive from the scan file (including inactive drives), make that drive current using the Tab or Shift-Tab keys, and press Shift-Delete. Note: these commands only remove the directories from the DM.DAT scan file, they do not erase files or directories from your hard drive. Printing -------- Press Alt-P to print the directory tree for the current drive. The following prompt will appear: Print tree to LPT (1,2,3): Press "1" to print to LPT1, "2" for LPT2, etc. Press Esc to cancel printing. Make sure your printer is set up to print extended ASCII characters. For most HP laser printers, the symbol set needed is "PC-8". Exit Directory Maven -------------------- Press Enter to change to the drive/directory highlighted and exit Directory Maven. Press Esc or Alt-X to exit Directory Maven without changing directories. Misc Information ---------------- Version 1.0 -- 2/18/94: initial release Version 1.1 -- 7/26/94: monochrome support (DMCONFIG.EXE) 43/50 line EGA/VGA support command line scanning forced drive search Version 1.2 -- 7/28/94: 43/50 line bug fix Directory Maven was written in Borland Pascal 7.0, approximately 1500 lines of code. Other Programs by the Author ---------------------------- If you like Directory Maven, please try my shareware product File Maven, a DOS file manager that supports copy/move/delete file operations including null-modem file transfers. Look for FMAVxx.ZIP on your favorite BBS/Disk Distributor or one of these sources: Compuserve ; GO IBMSYS The Consultant BBS 718-837-3236 ; ASP Hub, free 1st call download Space BBS 415-323-4193 ; ASP Hub, free 1st call download Exec-PC 414-789-4210 ; Largest BBS in USA, fee required ASP CD-ROM ; Software from Association of ; Shareware Professionals authors Please send suggestions for improvement to: Kent Briggs 109A Romana Circle Hewitt, TX 76643 My Compuserve ID is [72124,3234]. Fidonet users can find me in the SHAREWRE and PASCAL echoes or send Netmail to me at 1:388/26 or 1:154/280.