ZCPR2 And the OSBORNE-1 Before going into ZCPR2 and its features let me first give credit to its author and copyright holder Richard Conn. We owe a great deal of gratitude to Richard Conn for allowing us to benifit from what must have been a very laborious effort in producing this collection of programs. Some of you may already have been using ZCPR1, (better known as OZCPR) on your Osborne and know how useful it can be. For those of you who haven't yet enjoyed the benifits of ZCPR let me breifly summarize the features: JUMP: This command allows you to jump to a memory location and begin to execute a program at that address. This is usefull if you want to store some frequently used (though small) programs up in high memory. Screen size change for instance. GO: This command will execute whatever program is currently loaded in memory. This is handy if you load a program from one disc, such as unsq, remove that disk and replace with a blank one to send the unsqeezed file to but forget that the disk needs to be logged in to prevent bdos errors. Simply do a ctrl. C to log in the drive and return the CP/M prompt and then type GO. The unsq program will return to the screen without having to reread it. TYPE: Similar to the standard CCP type command but this one will pause after one page full of info and wait until you decide to continue by hitting any key. If you should want to scroll continuosly simply add a space P to the command line. eg. type example.txt P LIST: This is a new command which will send the following file to the list device, frees you from having to hit Ctrl. P Those of you familiar with ZCPR1 or OZCPR appreciate the path feature. This will search the present logged in drive for a file of the type on the command line and, not finding it there will automatically search the A drive for it, if there, it will load and execute it but remain logged into B drive, (in our case there are only the two). This relieves you from having to preceed the command with the drive name if not presently logged to it. ZCPR2 goes that one better by allowing a path search. The default path is present drive present user, present drive user 0, A drive present user, A drive user 0. Of course this is only of value if you use user areas but its there. For those unfamiliar with user areas see any good book on CP/M. Another feature of ZCPR2 is its way of displaying and logging into user areas. You no longer need to type in USER NN to change user areas, just enter NN: or Dev NN: and you will be logged to that area. You will also see the user number displayed. This feature is more useful to hard disk users then to we Osborne owners but is worth mentioning. This is also where ZCPR2 departs from ZCPR1 which does not respond this way. Perhaps the nicest feature however is the multiple command line that ZCPR2 supports. This allows you to type in several consecutive commands seperated by semi colons and have the computer act as if under the control of a submit file. This command can be up to 128 characters in length and does not care what disk is presently logged in. The uses of this feature are numerous indeed. There are also numerous support files that Richard Conn has created for use with ZCPR2, too many to mention here in their entirety but I will mention some. VFILER, I believe this can be used without having ZCPR2 implemented but you will not be able to call programs from it if you do not have ZCPR2 running. This is an excellent disk file utility similiar to DISK7 or SWEEP, the major differene is that it displays all files at once on the screen and allows you to move to and from them with your Wordstar ctrl. keys. It also has an extensive help file displayed when a ? is entered as the command. MENU, menu builds a cammand line based on input from the user and thus acts as an interface between him/her and the ZCPR2 command processor. It will then execute the selected command and return to the menu when done. ZEX, this little beauty is the king of submit type files. ZEX is a memory resident type of submit file and as such does not need to have the A drive as the default while processing. It combines many features of SUB2 and XSUB and allows many embedded commands. The above mentioned files are just some of the many produced and released to the public domain by Richard Conn and the explanations quite breif. For a more thorough explanation and an index of ZCPR2 utility files see the Users guide files also written by Richard Conn and on many RCP/M systems thoughout the country, (or maybe they're in FOG's library?). The only problem with what seems to be a dream come true, (yes there is a catch), is that to fully implement ZCPR2 and to make use of its exteneded features requires some modifications to the Osbornes' Bios. Osborne neglected to give we owners the bios source so it is not available to edit. However all if not lost. I sat down for what seemed to be forever and typed in the source from the technical manual and was then able to edit the Bios to include the features which make ZCPR2 so attractive. However there is another minor inconvience in that to make room for the ZCPR2 features I removed some of the disk formats supported by the original bios and as a result the only formats directly supported are the Osborne SD and DD. I say minor inconvience because if you want to read those formats just put in an original disk and copy the programs to your new ones. Why waste so much space for the few times you use it? Also any program which makes calls directly to the Bios instead of using the CP/M system calls, (generally considered poor programming practice) may not work correctly due to the routines being moved around. Uniform and Osize are examples of these, again simply use your unmodified disk when using any such program. The addition of these features does not mean you have to give up your usual conviences, ie. your function keys can still be programmed as usual and any other setup function will respond the same as before. Any one interested in trying out ZCPR2 on the Osborne can send me their name, address and twelve dollars, for which they will receive a disk with ZCPR2 already installed and a document file, (on the disk) of the important memory locations and there uses. I'll also include as many of the utility files as will fit on the disk. As I have not had the oppurturnity to try this modified bios on a single density only machine I cannot say whether it will function properly or not, try it at your own risk. This version, like OZCPR will automatically log in a disk drive when an ERA or SAVE command is executed. This is useful when you are going through a stack of disks and putting catalog numbers on them and don't want to log each disk in as you save the catalog number to it. Tired of your limited Auto start command? ZCPR2 will allow an autost program entry of up to 128 characters on cold boot. This combined with the multiple command line feature opens many possibilities on cold boot. Douglas Judd 2451 N. Sherman Blvd. Milwaukee Wi. 53210 (414)-444-7563 (voice only) ssibilities on cold boot. Douglas Judd 2451 N. Sherman Blvd. M