Msg: 1027 *Conference*

11-30-91 04:26:51

From: ELWIN HENNIS

To : RICHARD HANSON

Subj: SOFTWARE QUESTIONS

I work on the railroad and I ride a lot of trains.  Earlier this year my Model
100 finally wore out and couldn't be fixed without a total keyboard
replacement.  EXPENSIVE!  I bought a new Model 102.  This past summer I lost my
portable disk drive (PDD-1) on a train somewhere.  I just purchased a new one
but it is a portable disk drive 2 (PDD-2).  I can read the data on my four
boxes of PDD-1 formated disks O.K., but the software used to operate the old
drive will not work with the new PDD-2.  I used POWR-DOS by Acroatix Inc. for
the PDD-1.  It was nice because I could save or load data from a text file
without leaving it.  I could use disk utility programs writen to access
features of a transparent machine code POWR-DOS program in memory.  I could
make quick back-up copies of disks and read text from DO files from those
listed on an on-screen Disk File Directory.  I could hi-lite files and execute
a task on all the hi-lited files automatically one after another.  I could
KILL, SAVE, and LOAD files in groups.  One utility program could copy disks,
another utility sent disk files to a printer, and yet another utility could
edit files on a disk and save the updated file back to disk.  I could enter
BASIC and format a disk or use a utility file to format it differently. 
QUESTIONS: 1- I have PDD-1 formated data/program files on aprox. 45 disks that
need to to transferred to the PDD-2 format.  It took me hours to transfer over
the data one file at a time into memory until full, one file at a time onto a
new disk, delete one file at a time from memory, and repeat the process until
all the files were transferred over.  The BACKUP.BA program failed to transfer
over the files using the old format.   Do you know of a disk "copy" or "backup"
program that can do this easily? 2- Do you know a source for an updated
POWR-DOS by Acroatix Inc. for the PDD-2? 3- Are their other DOS programs just
as good as POWER DOS described above?  Does TS-DOS have the features of POWER
DOS?  I will need a TS-DOS for my Ultimate Rom 2, but once I am booted up I can
use another DOS program. 4- There must be something better than TELCOM.  Do you
have a program that will let you save and pull files from a disk, ECHO to a
printer and edit a response file while recieving data or being connected to a
BBS? 5- I'm looking for an easy, fast schedule-life and or project planning
software system that is popular and USED by a large number of 102 users.  If
its used its usually useful. 6- I want a Sardine spell checking program when
they become available.  When do you think this product can be shipped by Club
100?