EVEN IF YOU'RE NOT GOING TO READ THE DOCUMENTATION, PLEASE READ THIS FILE.
IT CONTAINS IMPORTANT INFORMATION ABOUT SETTING UP AND USING DF!


                  Directory Freedom (DF) Version 4.61B
          Copyright 1989 - 1999 by Gordon Haff.  All Rights Reserved.


          This program is Freeware. There is no charge to use it but
          it is NOT Public Domain.


          A product of Gordon Haff and Bit Masons Consulting
               gordon@alum.mit.edu


Description for file listings
-------------------------------------------

Short:    Directory Freedom 4.61: Small, fast, configurable file manager

Long:     See FILE_ID.DIZ

Feature Summary:
----------------
Directory Freedom 4.61 offers users a fast, compact alternative to DOS
Shells and a wide range of features including:

     A scrollable environment for examining files and directories
     Selective file and directory operations such as Copy/Move file;
          Rename/Delete file or directory; Change file/directory
          attribute; Create directory
     User-defined keys which can operate upon highlighted
          files (such as defined editors)
     SmartViewers which call different user-defined viewers depending on
          the highlighted file's extension
     Archive (e.g. .ZIP) creation
     File date/time modification
     Volume label editing
     Support for extended screen modes (e.g. 43/50 line)
     Extensive configuration through an external, user-friendly
          configuration program
     A very complete system information screen


There are many DOS shells on the market, but DF is small and fast.  Yet at
the same time, DF is powerful and highly configurable.  DF lets you
continue to use the utilities (such as file viewers) which you have become
comfortable with but it ENHANCES those utilities by providing a scrollable
environment from which they can be called.


Important operational notes for 4.61B:
-------------------------------------

If you are a 4.50 or 4.60 user, you can bring over your user-defined
settings.  Please read the installation section of the manual! There are
no user-defined data or configuration program changes from DF 4.61.


Files in DF461B.ZIP:
------------------

      DF.COM               Directory Freedom program file
      DF460.TXT            Documentation (version 4.60)
      DF461A.NEW           Info on DF 4.61/A new features
      DFCONFIG.EXE         Configuration program
      DFCONFIG.HLP         Hypertext help file for DFCONFIG
      DFHELP.TXT           New help text in a text file
      DF.ICO               Windows 3.0 icon
      LIBERTY.ICO          Another Win3 icon (from Phil Baltzer)
      READ_ME.DF           This file
      FILE_ID.DIZ          File description

      (The X-Ray file viewers version 1.03.)

      ZR.COM               Zip X-Ray
      AR.COM               ARJ X-Ray
      LR.COM               LHA X-Ray
      ZOR.COM              ZOO X-Ray
      UNARJXR.EXE          ARJ listing file generator
      XR103.TXT            Archive X-Ray documentation
      ZR.ZIF               Patch files
      AR.ZIF
      LR.ZIF
      ZOR.ZIF
      PATCH.COM            Patch program file
      PATCH.DOC


Documentation Note: Both DF 4.61 and DF 4.61B were basically maintenance
updates. The DF 4.60 documentation has therefore not been updated except
for some legal changes related to DF's freeware status and the
author's professional affiliations. I've made a few other obvious
changes as well but it still contains plenty of anachronisms and other
relics of the past. See the DF 4.61A.NEW file for program updates since DF
4.60.

Hardware Requirements and Important Information:
------------------------------------------------

Directory Freedom does not require any special hardware to operate.  It has
been tested across a wide range of IBM compatible hardware.  Graphics cards
and hard disks are NOT needed to use this program.

The Directory Freedom user-defined commands and archive creators come
preconfigured with command lines which use some common shareware and
freeware software.  Most of this software is NOT supplied with DF.  If you
do not have the appropriate programs on your system and accessible through
your PATH statement, the pre-configured commands WILL NOT WORK out of the
box.

DF will function with DOS 3.0 and later (DOS 3.3 and later recommended).

To run DF, you must set the DOS COMSPEC variable (e.g. SET
COMSPEC=c:\command.com).  This requirement is discussed in detail in the
manual.


Known Incompatibilities:
------------------------

A very few older systems have experienced a condition whereby certain
actions such as swapping the source and target directories can result in
DF going "blind" and being unable to read the directory contents.  This
blindness persists even after dropping to DOS and doing a 'dir' from the
command line.  NO DATA CORRUPTION OCCURS.  Rebooting the system clears the
"blindness."  The cause of this problem is unknown but started with
revision 4.60.  The only current workaround is to use DF 4.50.

Versions of PKUNZIP 2.xx prior to 2.04g should not be used.  EMS and XMS
corruption caused by earlier PKUNZIP 2.xx revs has been reported in
conjunction with a variety of programs.  In the case of DF, this
corruption can clobber the XMS or EMS memory used to store the active
directory while shelled out to DOS or a user-defined command such as one
which UNZIP's a file.  There are no known issues either with PKZIP/PKUNZIP
1.xx or with 2.04g.

The patch files for the X-Ray utilities contain an undocumented option
for enabling mouse support.  Enabling this mouse support has caused
problems on a number of test systems and was therefore removed from the
documented features of this release.  You are welcome to try enabling
this feature on your system but be aware that it may not work.


Distribution Points:
--------------------

At the time of this writing, the web site for Gordon Haff and Bit Masons
was: http://www.channel1.com/users/ghaff/ If this does not work, I would
suggest just doing a search on Gordon Haff and/or Bit Masons which is
likely to turn up my current home page.

http://www.channel1.com/users/ghaff/bitmason/