
INTRODUCTION

DSKCASE version 1.03 is an one pass, menu driven diskette management utility. 
It simply moves your plastic diskettes box or a heavy metal diskette cabinet 
into the hard disk of your computer. Because the capacity of hard disks nowadays 
is getting bigger and bigger and the computer speed is getting faster and faster,
it is finally possible and practical to compress, retrieve, copy, store, sort, 
check, file and lock your diskettes directly in your hard disk, all-in-one, 
easy and safe. DSKCASE can also work on non-DOS diskettes.

FILE LIST

         contained in DSKIT13.zip are 17 files:

                DSKCASE.exe             Main program
                DSKCOPY.exe             Copying program
                DSKRDWT.exe             Disk read/write program
                DSKRASE.exe             Deleting program
                DSKFRIZ.exe             Compressing program
                DSKLOGO.exe             Editing program
                
                LOGOFILE                Sample logofile
                LOGOA.lis               Sample logofile
                LOGOB.lis               Sample logofile
                LOGOC.lis               Sample logofile
                LOGOD.lis               Sample logofile
                LOGOE.lis               Sample logofile
                
                DSKCASE.txt             this file you are reading
                SHARWARE.txt            Shareware Text
                ORDER.frm               Order form
                INSTALL.txt             Install/System requirements
                README.txt              Uploading text


HOW TO START

DSKCASE is all menu driven, no command line needed. Having received the package
DSKIT12.zip, make a directory in  your Hard Disk where you want to run DSKCASE.
Then unzip the DSKIT12.zip package into the directory and check the above file
list to make sure that all files are here. 

After this if you type "DSKCASE" or" dskcase" at DOS, there will be a 
                  
                   MAIN MENU with 4 choices:
              
                   (D) isk to file
                   (F) ile to disk
                   (E) rase
                   (Q) uit

1. Copy diskette to an image file and save it in hard disk
If you want to begin with copying/compressing a diskette to an image file 
and automatically save it to hard disk under DSKCASE, knock d or D WITHOUT 
enter. 

(D)isk to file

DSKCASE will then ask you to type in a file name for the disk image file you 
want to save. It can be any name with less than 9 characters, and a three
character extension. No digital, empty spaces, or none-letters such as: ? * - 
/ |... are allowed in the file name. If you have typed only a pure file name 
with 1 to 8 characters without any extension, then ENTER, DSKCASE will auto- 
matically add .LIS as a default extension to the file name. 

You can use different .xxx extensions to sort your diskette image files, this
will be very helpful for you. For example, you can name all of your banking 
diskettes as banka.fat, bankb.fat...bankz.fat; and all of your leisure time
diskettes as funtimea.fun, funtimeb.fun...funtimez.fun. The default extension
is .LIS, which will be added to a valid file name without extension. If you
happened to type in a file name which is already existing in the hard disk,
DSKCASE will refuse this file name and ask you to give another name instead.

You can also type in ESC or esc and then press ENTER to return to the MAIN 
MENU, if you don't want to save any diskettes to an image file now.

If everything is OK, DSKCASE will then ask you to choose which floppy disk drive 
you are going to use for this copying. DSKCASE works only with Drive A or Drive 
B. You just need to knock A or a; B or b and ENTER. If you press ENTER directly,
the default drive is Drive A.

The defaults for Disk to File function are:
                        filename.LIS
                        Drive A

If the file name and drive are correct, DSKCASE will prompt an editing screen with a title of LOGOFILE. This is the 
where you can type in the contains in the diskette which you are going to
copy to an image file. This logofile will later be compressed and packed 
together with the disk image file, and each time DSKCASE opens the disk image
file, it will first open this logofile for you to check what is in the diskette
Or you can consider this logofile is simply a computerized disk label, stick-
ing to the diskette it belongs.  Although you  can  write  much more on this 
"computerized label" than on a paper label, we still recommend this logofile 
should be as short as possible: totally less than 21 lines, each line with 
less than 70 characters.

( included please find some sample logofiles, named as LOGOA.LIS, LOGOB.LIS, 
LOGOC.LIS... You can use DOS copy command to copy one of them as LOGOFILE, or 
in the MS DOS EDITOR use SAVE AS command to name one of them as LOGOFILE, and 
use them directly as your logofile. They are only a trigger to your creative 
mind to build more lively logofiles. Please don't delete them or rename them, 
because the extension .LIS is also used to keep the listings not empty so DSKCASE 
can work properly. Those LOGOx.LIS files are simple text files,not compressed 
and not encoded, DSKCASE cannot extract them onto a disk)

Now DSKCASE will read the diskette, copy it to a file, compress the file, and 
at last save it in the hard disk under the name of filename.LIS, or the file 
name with extension you have given. You can see the procedures on the screen 
when DSKCASE works. If you may make some common mistakes, DSKCASE will ask you 
to correct it before it can carry out the next step. 
( such as the diskette is write-protected, or there is no diskette in the drive 
at all...)

After each copying DSKCASE will automatically go back to the MAIN MENU, waiting 
for you to make next choice.

2. Restore Image file back to a diskette
Now you can check to see if the diskette has been copied/compressed to a file 
and saved in the hard disk under DSKCASE -- and extract it back to a diskette. 

(F)ile to Disk

Simply knock F or f at the Main Menu will trigger File to Disk function. 
DSKCASE will ask you to choose a floppy drive. Do the  same like before, 
type a/A or b/B, and then ENTER to confirm. 

DSKCASE will now ask you " list what ?". This means what specific extension of 
the files you are going to ask the DSKCASE to list for you. As we have explained 
before that you can catalog your files with different extensions, now you can 
ask DSKCASE ONLY to list all the files with a specific extension. For example,
if you type in " *.fat" and ENTER, DSKCASE will ONLY list files with the extension
of .fat, and that's all of your banking files. You can also type in " *.*",
and DSKCASE will show you a full list of all files in its "cabinet". 

If you type nothing at all but press ENTER directly; DSKCASE will show you 
a list of all files with extension of.LIS as default. The result will be the 
same as if you have typed " *.lis".

But before you can see the listing, you still have to answer one more question 
for DSKCASE, -- Listing according to the sequence of file Name or file Date ?  
This is to say if you type here D to ask DSKCASE to list according to file date,
the first file on top of the listing will be the file with the oldest date, and 
the last file at the bottom of the listing will be the latest one, no matter 
what file name they have. If you type N, DSKCASE will list all files alphabetically 
according to the file names, no matter when those files were made. 

If you type neither D nor N, but press ENTER directly, DSKCASE will list files 
alphabetically according to file names as default.

Then DSKCASE will ask you which floppy disk drive you want to use. DSKCASE
works only on drive A or drive B.  Type in A or B accordingly, and ENTER.

If you type in nothing but press ENTER directly, it will be the same like you
have typed A or a, because the default drive is Drive A.

To sum up, if you have answered DSKCASE only with ENTER,the defaults will be:    
                         list all files with extension .LIS
                         list alphabetically of filenames
                         using Drive A

Having answered all questions correctly, DSKCASE will now prompt the listing
according to your requirement. You can move the rolling bar up and down until 
you have chosen the file you want to extract to a diskette. If is is a long list, 
you can always type only the first letter of the file name you want,for example 
"T", then the rolling bar will jump from anywhere to the first file name beginning 
with "T". This can shorten your searching time if it is really a long list. 

When the rolling bar is on the file name you want, press ENTER to tell DSKCASE 
your choice. DSKCASE will first open the logofile sticking to this disk file, 
which you have edited before, informing you the contents of this diskette. You
can make sure if this is the file you want to extract to  diskette. But you 
can NOT do any editing now. If this file has no logofile ( not a DSKCASE image 
file) you have to knock N to return to the listing.

At the bottom of this logofile screen, you will see a Yes/No choice. If you 
press y or Y, DSKCASE will ask you how many copies you want from the same image
file. Type in a digit you want ( 1 to 99) and ENTER, then DSKCASE will do the 
extracting for you. 

After you have inserted a diskette and pressed ENTER, DSKCASE will check the 
size of diskette in the floppy drive to see if it is sufficient enough to restore 
a complete imagefile. If everything is OK, it will go ahead; otherwise DSKCASE  
will ask you to re-insert another diskette. You can see on the operating screen
the size of the diskette required to restore a complete image file.If you have  
inserted a correct diskette, DSKCASE will extract the disk image file to your 
diskette accordingly. BUT NOT THE LOGOFILE !  The logofile will not be extracted 
to your diskette. You will have exactly what you HAD on your original diskette,
if the original disk is BOOTABLE, the extracted disk is also BOOTABLE. 

The diskette after the extraction will reflect the size and format of the original
diskette, from which this disk image file was made. You can also call this as
conversion, if you would like.

Remember to replace the diskette after each copying if you have asked for more 
than one copy. DSKCASE will count automatically for you.   

If you press n or N , DSKCASE will pack up the logofile file and return to the 
listing screen,  where you can make next choice or press ESC to return to MAIN MENU.

3. Erase or delete saved files

(E)rase Data

You just knock e or E at the MAIN MENU, DSKCASE will lead you to the menu
of listing all files you can delete. You will have to repeat the same procedures
as you did in the File to disk function to tell DSKCASE which extensions you
want and list according to dates or file names. The same like in the File to Disk
function, the defaults are :
                            list all files with extension .LIS
                            list alphabetically of filenames

In the listing, move the rolling bar to the file you want to erase and press 
ENTER. DSKCASE will first show you the logofile of this disk and ask Yes/No 
choice. If you press y or Y, this file is deleted. If you press n or N, DSKCASE 
will pack up the logofile and return to the listing, waiting for you to make 
next choice. Now you can also press ESC to return to MAIN MENU.

4. Quit DSKCASE

At MAIN MENU, knock q or Q, DSKCASE will wind up and return to DOS.

TECHNICAL REQUIREMENTS:

 DSKCASE requires at least 512K free RAM under 1MB conventional memory to
work properly. There should be no un-chained or lost clusters in your hard 
disk. You may use SCANDISK, DEFRAG, MEM, MEMMAKER commands of MS DOS, or other 
disk utility such as PCTOOLS and NORTON to make sure of this.

 A good floppy disk drive and fully IBM compatible computer with AT compatible
BIOS are strong guarantees for DSKCASE to work properly.

 DSKCASE is designed to work only for industry standard floppy drive A and B.
      
      Drive A is supposed to be at the port address of 3F0H, BIOS 0
      Drive B is supposed to be at the port address of 3F0H, BIOS 1  

 As 5.25" floppy disk has been out of production long before, DSKCASE is designed 
 work only on 3.5" floppy disks. It can recognize most  3.5"  disk formats, 
 including none-DOS formats, such as:
                
                Tracks       Sectors           Size           Disk Type                                      
                 80             9              720K             DS/DD
                 80            15              1.2MB            DS/HD            
                 82            15              1.23MB           DS/HD
                 80            17              1.36MB           DS/HD
                 82            17              1.39MB           DS/HD
                 80            18              1.44MB           DS/HD
                 82            18              1.47MB           DS/HD
                 80            20              1.60MB           DS/HD
                 82            20              1.64MB           DS/HD
                 80            21              1.68MB           DS/HD
                 82            21              1.72MB           DS/HD
                
                *80            36              2.88MB           DS/ED
 
 * not guaranteed
 
 
 Hints: 
 
 a.  It does not matter if you have a 5.25" floppy disk drive on your computer.
 You can use it to work on DSKCASEG, there is no difference for DSKCASEG; only 
 the displaying DISK TYPE will not match. DSKCASEG's disk type function works 
 only for 3.5" disks. DSKCASEG can save a diskette of any size to an image file,
 but it works only on a diskette equal/larger than 80 tracks and 9 sectors when 
 it restores an image file back to a diskette.( 80x9, 720K, DS/DD is the smallest
 size of 3.5" diskettes) It thus works with no difference on any  1.2M  5.25" 
 ( 80x15) diskettes as on a 1.2M  3.5" (80x15) diskette.
 
 b.  You can retrieve a disk file onto a disk which has a different size to the 
 original disk. Normally you can only retrieve a disk file from a smaller size
 disk onto a larger disk. So you can use 5.25" disk drive to copy a disk file
 and later use a 3.5" disk drive to retrieve it to a larger disk. But no matter
 how large the later disk is, its rest part is no longer usable. Its size and
 format will reflect the 5.25" disk size and format after the retrieving.
 
 c. If there are too many error readings during disk read/write, especially with
 some large capacity diskettes or strange formats, QUIT DSKCASE. Then check free
 memory size and make sure there is no un-chained or lost clusters in the hard 
 disk; and NO other BIOS enhanced program in use (or just used before) or in TSR. 
 After this checking, RE-BOOT the computer and try again.
 
 d. As most 3.5" disks on the market nowadays are pre-formatted when they are 
 ex-factory, DSKCASE will no longer format disks for you. We will, however, 
 include a BIOS enhanced Disk format utility that can offer most known Disk 
 formations working under DOS (all formats as listed above) in the REGISTERED 
 Version.
 
 Revision history
      
      August of 1997
            DSKCASE Version 1.03
            deploy memory NOT on stacks, but still keep good speed.
      
      March of 1997   
            DSKCASE Version 1.02
            added an independent editor to replace MS DOS Editor
            fixed a few bugs ( thanks to the users who have reported them)
            As required by a number of shareware users, we have removed
            some functions from the registered version into the shareware
            version.
      
      September of 1996     
            DSKCASE Version 1.01
            first release
 
 If you would have any further requirements, comments, suggestions or bug report
 on DSKCASE, please feel free to contact us at: 
                         
                          LiAnja@aol.com
           or:
                         Anja & Li Tao Man
                         
                         HUNEFELDSTR.  51
                         D - 42285  Wuppertal
                         GERMANY

                         
 It will be a great pleasure for us to meet your requirements.


 Anja & Li Tao Man
 August of 1997
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