Working with DOS

Working with DOS

SCO OpenServer includes several DOS utilities that let you access and manipulate files on DOS disks and DOS partitions on your hard disk. You must have a bootable, although not active, DOS partition on the hard disk or a DOS floppy disk to use these SCO OpenServer commands. For example, you can only transfer a file from a UNIX partition on the hard disk to a DOS floppy disk if either the DOS floppy disk is bootable or there is also a DOS partition on the hard disk.

NOTE: Mounting DOS filesystems and accessing the files directly with UNIX commands is faster and more efficient than using the doscmd(C) utilities. See ``Using mounted DOS filesystems'' for more information.

SCO OpenServer systems do not record bad tracks in the DOS area of the hard disk. If a bad track develops in the DOS area, an operation such as doscp that attempts to access the affected area may fail (resulting in the Error on fixed disk message).

NOTE: When trying to use the DOS utilities to access files on your DOS partition, you may see the error message bad media byte. This message indicates that the DOS partition on the hard disk is not bootable. You can make your DOS partition bootable by first backing up the files on the DOS partition, booting DOS from the floppy, and formatting the DOS partition using the command:

format c: /s

You should now reinstall your DOS files.

This chapter explains how to:

NOTE: You cannot execute (run) DOS programs or applications from SCO OpenServer unless NeTraverse Merge is installed.