
                                    FYI

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          TITLE: OS/2 AND DR DOS COMPATIBILITY
   DOCUMENT ID#: FYI-M-1617
           DATE: 06NOV92
        PRODUCT: OS/2 & DR DOS
PRODUCT VERSION:         6.0
     SUPERSEDES: 05JUN92

GENERAL NOTES

DR DOS 6.0 and OS/2 are compatible and will work well together. It
is the full features of DR DOS 6.0 that will be covered in this
document and not the general compatibility. OS/2 is a separate
operating system and uses a separate shell to operate DOS
applications. Many of the features in DR DOS can be operated in
both operating systems, where some will only work while booted
under DR DOS. Other features cannot be utilized because of
conflicts with OS/2, and any use of these features should be done
with extreme caution.

Definitions:
DOS Shell - the DOS shell provided with OS/2.  This DOS Shell is
not DR DOS specific, although it will use the EXTERNAL commands in
the DOS PATH.

Virtual Disk - This is the Virtual Disk Image feature of OS/2. 

DR DOS FEATURES

DELWATCH  Will not operate in a DOS shell under OS/2 or in Virtual 
          Disk.

DELPURGE  Will not operate in a DOS shell under OS/2, but will    
          function in Virtual Disk.

DISKMAP   Operates successfully in the DOS shell, but does not    
          function in Virtual Disk.

DISKOPT   Will not run in the DOS shell.  When run in the DR DOS
          environment DISKOPT will optimize the DR DOS files but
          has no effect on OS/2 files.

PASSWORD  Shows incorrect version of operating system in an OS/2  
          environment.  DR DOS files and directories currently    
          having passwords are not secured.

SCRIPT    Shows an incorrect version of the operating system in the
          DOS shell.

SECURITY  If Security is enabled, OS/2 WILL NOT boot under any    
           circumstances. Security should not be used.

SuperSTOR Extended partitions of the hard disk can be compressed  
          with SSTOR.EXE while booted under DR DOS 6.0.  These    
          partitions cannot be read by OS/2 and the driver cannot 
          be loaded in the OS/2 CONFIG.SYS file.  Applications on 
          the compressed drive will not be accessible while       
          operating in the DOS shell - they are accessible in the
          Virtual Disk.

SuperPCK  SuperPCK can be used under either operating system but  
          will not provide any benefit while booted under OS/2.   
          OS/2 has its own cache, making SuperPCK unecessary.  This

          feature should not be used in the Virtual Disk.

TASKMAX   Will not operate in a DOS shell under OS/2.  OS/2 is a  
          multi-tasking environment so TASKMAX is unecessary in the
          Virtual Disk.  

VIEWMAX   OS/2 has a graphical interface so VIEWMAX is not        
          necessary, but it will run in the DOS shell.  2(two)    
          arrows will be displayed, one for OS/2 and one for      
          VIEWMAX.  Wait until the viewmax arrow (there is a slight

          delay in movement between the two arrows) is placed over 
          the desired action before clicking the mouse button.

UNDELETE  Will not operate in a DOS shell under OS/2, but does    
          function in Virtual Disk.


INTERNAL COMMANDS

These commands are taken over by the OS/2 environment so they are
no longer internal to DR DOS.  Refer to your OS/2 documentation for
more information on the internal commands for OS/2.

VER       Shows OS/2 in the OS/2 DOS shell but will show DR DOS 6.0
          in Virtual Disk.

EXTERNAL COMMANDS

The following DR DOS external commands work with certain
exceptions:

FORMAT    With the exception of /S all switches function correctly.

          The /S switch will cause the system files to be copied, 
          but the disk will not be bootable.

TREE      Works fine in either environment but provides statistics 
          in a different format than the OS/2 version.

EDITOR    Works fine in DOS shell but has different features than 
          EDLIN.

MEM       Works fine in DOS shell but provides statistics in a    
          different format than the OS/2 Version.

SYS       Copies the system files for DR DOS but the disk is not  
          bootable.  Does work in Virtual Disk, but takes the files

          from the disk image not the hard disk.


The following external commands are included with OS/2 and should
be used when in the OS/2 environment:

*CHKDSK.COM, FORMAT.COM, MODE.COM, XCOPY.EXE, DISKCOPY.COM,
DISKCOMP.COM, REPLACE.EXE, COMP.COM, MORE.COM, PRINT.COM, FIND.EXE,
KEYB.COM, BACKUP.EXE, FDISK.COM, RECOVER.COM, LABEL.COM, TREE.COM,
SORT.EXE, UNDELETE.COM, ATTRIB.EXE, RESTORE.EXE, EDLIN.COM, MEM.EXE

*Use of OS/2 CHKDSK /F on any drive formatted with DR DOS 6 or
COMPAQ DOS 3.31 will result in corruption of the file allocation
table.  Consult IBM for more details.

Other external commands either do not work in the OS/2 environment
or they function normally, but have not been tested at this time. 
Refer to the OS/2 documentation for features that can be utilized
in OS/2 and avoid these conflicts. 
