THE MS-DOS KERMIT VERSION 3.14 DISTRIBUTION DISKETTE January 1995 Copyright (C) 1982, 1995, Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York. The MS-DOS Kermit software may not be, in whole or in part, licensed or sold for profit as a software product itself, nor may it be included in or distributed with commercial products or otherwise distributed by commercial concerns to their clients or customers without written permission of the Office of Kermit Development and Distribution, Columbia University. This copyright notice must not be removed, altered, or obscured. Welcome to MS-DOS Kermit 3.14: high-quality, full-function communication software for IBM and compatible PCs with DOS or Windows. The documentation for MS-DOS Kermit is "Using MS-DOS Kermit", second edition, by Christine M. Gianone, published by Digital Press / Butterworth-Heinemann, Woburn, MA, 1992, 345 pages, ISBN 1-55558-082-3. Call Columbia University at +1 212 854-3703 or Digital Press at +1 800 366-2665 to order. The KERMIT.UPD file on your diskette describes features added since publication of "Using MS-DOS Kermit". If you are installing MS-DOS Kermit for the first time: 1. Place the Kermit diskette in drive A: (or B:). 2. Create a KERMIT directory on your hard disk, e.g. MKDIR C:\KERMIT. 3. XCOPY A:*.* C:\KERMIT /S (substitute B: for A: if necessary). 4. Edit the MSCUSTOM.INI file to suit your needs and preferences. 5. Edit your AUTOEXEC.BAT file to insert the Kermit directory in your PATH. See the APPENDIX at the end of this file about how to edit files. If you are replacing an older version of MS-DOS Kermit (this illustration assumes it is in C:\KERMIT): 1. Place the Kermit diskette in drive A: (or B:). 2. Copy your old MSCUSTOM.INI and DIALUPS.TXT to a safe place. 3. XCOPY A:*.* C:\KERMIT /S (substitute B: for A: if necessary). 4. Copy your old MSCUSTOM.INI and DIALUPS.TXT files back to C:\KERMIT. If you want to run MS-DOS Kermit from a RAM disk (to save startup time), you may copy KERMIT.EXE to the RAM disk, but please do not copy MSKERMIT.INI or the other Kermit files to the RAM disk, because (as of version 3.14), MS-DOS Kermit expects to find its subdirectories in the same directory where the MSKERMIT.INI file was found. To use Kermit in Microsoft Windows, also perform the following steps in Windows: 1. Open the group window for the group you want to add Kermit to. 2. Choose New from the File menu. The New Program dialog box appears. 3. Select Program Item and choose OK. 4. Type "MS-DOS Kermit 3.14" in the Description text box. 5. Type the pathname of the KERMIT.PIF file in the Command Line box, e.g. "C:\KERMIT\WINDOWS\KERMIT.PIF" (without the quotes). 6. Choose OK, and now you should have an MS-DOS icon that starts Kermit with the right PIF settings. 7. If you want to assign a special icon to Kermit, click on the "generic MS-DOS" Kermit icon, then click on File, then Properties, then Change Icon, and then pick a new one (like the VT or satellite dish from MORICONS.DLL). 8. The PIF file assumes that KERMIT.EXE is in your PATH. If you did not store the KERMIT.EXE file in a directory that is in your PATH, you will have to use the PIFEDIT program on the KERMIT.PIF file to specify the full path name. 9. If you plan to use networks, read about WINPKT in NETWORKS\SETUP.DOC. If you don't have a hard disk: (a) make a backup copy of the original Kermit diskette, (b) put the original aside, (c) remove unneeded files and directories from your backup copy (e.g. NETWORKS, CYRILLIC, HEBREW, etc) to make space for downloading files, etc, and (d) edit the MSCUSTOM.INI file to suit your requirements. For network installation, see "Using MS-DOS Kermit" Chapter 16 plus the supplementary material in NETWORKS\SETUP.DOC. The MS-DOS Kermit distribution diskette contains the following files in its top-level directory, plus several subdirectories that contain more files. Files marked as "(text)" are simple, plain, ordinary ASCII text. You may view these files with the DOS or Kermit TYPE command, the DOS MORE command, a text editor (such as the DOS EDIT program) or word processing program in plain-text (ASCII) mode, or print them on your printer. Files marked as "(binary)" can not be viewed or displayed. ------------------------------ Files in the TOP-LEVEL DIRECTORY: READ.ME (text) This file. KERMIT.EXE (binary) The MS-DOS Kermit program for the IBM PC family, the IBM PS/2, and compatibles, full-featured, ready to run. KERMITE.EXE (binary) A smaller version of MS-DOS Kermit, with networking and graphics terminal capabilities removed, to be used on PCs with small memories if KERMIT.EXE won't fit. KERLITE.EXE (binary) A very small version of MS-DOS Kermit, with no networking and no terminal emulator (and no CONNECT command), but including full file transfer and scripting capabilities to be used as an external protocol and/or script-execution engine. MSR314.PCH, MSRM314.PCH, MSRL314.PCH (text) Patches, if any, for KERMIT.EXE, KERMITE.EXE, KERLITE.EXE, respectively. Read the file for a description of each patch. MSKERMIT.INI (text) The standard initialization file for MS-DOS Kermit. Includes many of the macro definitions from Chapter 14 of "Using MS-DOS Kermit", e.g. for setting up your modem-dialing environment. You should not make any changes to this file. If you want to override or undo any definitions made here, please do it in MSCUSTOM.INI. MSCUSTOM.INI (text) A SAMPLE customization file. Read, then edit this file to suit your needs and preferences. Be sure to save it in text (ASCII) mode, and not in any kind of word-processing format. In particular, use this file to set your modem type, startup communications parameters, preferred colors, any special key mappings you might want, and so on. DIALUPS.TXT (text) A sample dialing directory, for use with the DIAL command. This file does not contain any real phone numbers. If you want to have a dialing directory, edit this file to contain entries for the computers or services that you actually use. Read KERMIT.UPD for further information. KERMIT.UPD (text) A supplement to "Using MS-DOS Kermit", describing the features that have been added since MS-DOS Kermit version 3.11 was released. KERMIT.HLP (text) A brief summary of the commands and functions of MS-DOS Kermit. KERMIT.BWR (text) The MS-DOS Kermit 3.14 "Beware File". Frequently asked questions, hints and tips, limitations, problems, workarounds. If you are having trouble using MS-DOS Kermit, read this file. You might find a solution or workaround. COLS132.BAT (text) A DOS Batch file invoked automatically by Kermit if the host sends a "switch to 132-column mode" escape sequence or if you give the SET TERMINAL WIDTH 132 command to MS-DOS Kermit, but only if Kermit does not already have built-in knowledge of your video adapter. As supplied, this batch file only prints a message. You must fill it in with the appropriate DOS commands to put your screen into 132-column mode (as supplied by the manufacturer of your video adapter). COLS80.BAT (text) Like COLS132.BAT, but for changing from 132-column mode to 80-column mode. -------------- SUBDIRECTORIES -------------- PERFORM An article, PERFORM.DOC, from Kermit News #5, June 1993, discussing Kermit file transfer performance and benchmarking it against other popular protocols and software. -------------- MODEMS Dialing scripts and information for various types of modems. If you are using one of these modems rather than the default Hayes 1200 or 2400, follow the directions to use it for dialing. All files in this subdirectory are text files. Read the MODEMS\READ.ME file to get started. -------------- NETWORKS Drivers and information that are useful with Kermit's built-in networking. See the NETWORKS\READ.ME file for further information. -------------- KEYBOARD Keymaps and keyboard-related utilities. See the KEYBOARD\READ.ME file for details. -------------- UTILS General utility programs to be used with MS-DOS Kermit. See UTILS\READ.ME. -------------- WINDOWS Stuff for Windows: KERMIT.PIF file, icon, etc. -------------- PCFONTS Different character sets for your PC -- Hebrew, Russian, etc. See PCFONTS\READ.ME for details. -------------- CYRILLIC Cyrillic character-set support and tables for MS-DOS Kermit. See CYRILLIC\READ.ME for further information. -------------- HEBREW Hebrew character-set support and tables for MS-DOS Kermit. See HEBREW\READ.ME for further information. -------------- ROMAN Roman-alphabet character-set tables. See ROMAN\READ.ME for details. -------------- Kermit software programs for hundreds of other kinds of computers are available on diskette or magnetic tape or cartridge from Kermit Distribution at Columbia University. Contact: Kermit Distribution Columbia University Academic Information Systems 612 West 115th Street New York, NY 10025 USA Phone: +1 212 854-3703 Fax: +1 212 663-8202 Email: kermit@columbia.edu Web: http://www.columbia.edu/kermit/ APPENDIX: EDITING FILES ON THE PC Your AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS are "plain text" files. The same is true of all Kermit command and initialization files. You can modify such files using the DOS EDLIN or EDIT programs. EDLIN and EDIT are documented in your DOS manual. The recommended method for editing these files is to use the DOS EDIT program. Let's suppose you want to modify your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. First, make a backup copy in case something goes wrong: cd c:\ copy autoexec.bat autoexec.bak And then start the editor: edit autoexec.bat This brings up a screen showing the file. You can move through the file with the arrow keys until you find the line you want to change, in our case the line that starts with "PATH=". Use the End key to position the cursor at the end of the "PATH=" line, then type the text you want to add, such as ";C:\KERMIT". To save the file, press Alt-f (hold down Alt, press f) to activate the File menu. Then use the down-arrow key to highlight the Save item, and then press the Enter key. To exit from EDIT, press Alt-f again, use the arrow key to highlight Exit, and press Enter. If you are using a word processing program to create or modify a DOS or Kermit command file, do not include any special effects (bold, underline, italics), and be sure to save the file in text mode. The method for doing this depends on the word processor. In Microsoft Word 5.0, for example, press the Esc key to get to the menu, press T to choose Transfer, press S to choose Save, type the filename, use the arrow keys to get to the "format" line, choose Text-Only, press Enter to save the file, and then leave the program by pressing the Esc key and then Q. In WordPerfect 5.1, use Ctrl-F5 (hold down the Ctrl key and press the F5 key) to save the file, press T to select DOS Text, 1 to Save, type the filename and press Enter, and quit from WordPerfect by pressing the F7 key. (End of MS-DOS Kermit 3.14 READ.ME)