Running a dos program on xp - Tech Support Forums

mrniceguy · May 10th, 2007, 11:09 AM

At the business we still have to run wordstar 2000 due to our old invoices, however running it on windows can be dangerous. If you run 2 at the same time while they're operating in the same directory they will delete everything there due to some strange way it has of editing files. This wasn't a problem till we tried to get a slighty older computer illiterate employee to ship with it. she'll often have 6 or 7 of these windows open due to frustration...or something I don't understand...

anyways, is there any way to set the program or shortcut so that only one instance can be opened?

theedisoneffect · May 10th, 2007, 11:43 AM

Not using the Windows command terminal, AFAIK. Possibly try using DOSBox? It basically creates a virtual DOS machine within XP. I'm not sure if you can prevent multiple instances of that either, though.

Other possible solution might be, if only a limited number of programs are needed on the computers, have all of them run fullscreen at startup, then get rid of any shortcuts and such, and just have users Alt-Tab between them. This would only be practical if it's a set few programs that are needed, though.

mrniceguy · May 10th, 2007, 12:33 PM

it's a dos program so it basically is run off a dosbox emulation. we start it with a shortcut which doesn't seem to have any options in it that help me.

theedisoneffect · May 10th, 2007, 01:07 PM

Yes, but are you running it from the built-in command interface, or an actual separate DOS emulator? DOSBox works a bit differently than the built-in Windows one, which may make a difference.

mrniceguy · May 10th, 2007, 01:10 PM

oh, no I'm using the windows one. We create a shortcut to the exe in windows to run it.

theedisoneffect · May 10th, 2007, 01:32 PM

Well I just played around with DOSBox, and it doesn't look like it'll do anything to prevent multiple instances either.

Have you perchance looked into some of the conversion programs available for Wordstar documents? Or, for that matter, thought about setting up some old DOS machines around the office? That might actually be easier than getting the thing to run safely under Windows.

mrniceguy · May 10th, 2007, 01:45 PM

we just managed to convert everything from the old 486 boxes, guess if nobody else has any ideas I'll just have to try to teach her some windows awareness.

Rootstonian · May 10th, 2007, 03:33 PM

Just hire me...I'll do the conversions for you...just a mere $100/hour. Minimum 40 hours and you'll never look back

theedisoneffect · May 11th, 2007, 12:50 PM

Quote:

I'll just have to try to teach her some windows awareness.

I don't suppose that could be a bad idea regardless. Inept users can screw up a lot of things, not just invoices.

Sorry dude, but I'm out of other ideas. This is prolly one of those cases where the program went obsolete for good reason.