What is 4DOS?

4DOS is a ~~shareware~~ free (see below) replacement for COMMAND.COM that includes:

More commands,
Enhancements to those commands shared with COMMAND.COM,
User-definable names for commands with ALIAS,
Two types of batch files:
- filename.BAT as in COMMAND.COM,
- filename.BTM (faster) for files to run in memory,
Better Command-Line Recall and Editing,
On-Line Help whenever you are at the command-line prompt,
More flow-control commands (DO WHILE ..., iterated DO loops, GOSUB and RETURN, block IFF ... THEN ... ELSE ... ENDIFF, and more)
and Functions that can be evaluated on the command-line.

A couple of examples of enhancements:
(a) With COMMAND.COM:

 
        CLS 
        DIR *.COM /P 
        DIR *.EXE /P 
        DEL *.BAK

Clear the screen, delete all .BAK files, and list all programmes.
(b) With 4DOS: (older version)

 
    CLS BRIGHT WHITE ON BLUE^DEL /P *.BAK^DIR /P *.COM;*.EXE

Clears the screen to the user's desired colours, deletes all backup files, prompting for confirmation, and lists all programmes in a single listing with a single command-line entry. For the much older version, use '+' instead of ';' in the DIR command. The current version also allows you to display different file-types (by attribute or extension) in different colours.

How Can I Get It?

With Norton's Utilities.

An older version of 4DOS with cosmetic changes has been licenced by Symantec Corporation for inclusion in the Norton Utilities under the name of NDOS.

Directly From the Copyright Holder.

You can write to or call:

 
        J.P. Software, 
        P.O. Box 1470, 
        E. Arlington, MA 02174 
        USA 
 
        (Telephone:  (617) 646-3975.)

I have now found a web-site address for them:
"http://www.jpsoft.com/".

Since the numbers of DOS and OS/2 users has declined so much, J.P. Software has discontinued support of 4DOS and 4OS2 and are concentrating on 4NT and Take Command for NT and NT-lookalikes (Win 2k, Windows ME, Windows XP). They have now released 4DOS and 4OS2 as FREEWARE. See their Downloads page for details.

Other J.P. Software links:

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