DOS ain't dead

Zyzzle 02.09.2013, 04:39 @ ron	Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles Post reply
	I've never had the need, but your best bets will be Nconvert or Image Alchemy commandline. I think Nconvert 5.70 has a dos binary, but I looked briefly and I could only see 4.90 available.

ron

Australia,
02.09.2013, 05:06

@ Zyzzle

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Post reply

> I've never had the need, but your best bets will be Nconvert or Image
> Alchemy commandline. I think Nconvert 5.70 has a dos binary, but I looked
> briefly and I could only see 4.90 available.

I have Nconvert 5.90 for DOS, but that doesn't recognise the file format.
Will look for Image Alchemy - thanks. :)

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RayeR

CZ,
02.09.2013, 13:33

@ Zyzzle

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Post reply

Maybe ImageMagick? I guess there's some DOS build or it can run under HX but didn't checked if supports required format.

---
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Rugxulo Usono, 02.09.2013, 13:30 @ ron	Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles Post reply
	> Does anybody know of a DOS application that can render, or convert to > another codec, Windows metafiles: image/x-wmf, image/x-emf ? "Blocek ... can be also used as image viewer (BMP, PCX, GIF, PNG, JPG and WMF)."

ron

Australia,
03.09.2013, 01:34

@ Rugxulo

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Post reply

> > Does anybody know of a DOS application that can render, or convert to
> > another codec, Windows metafiles: image/x-wmf, image/x-emf ?
>
> "Blocek ... can be also used as image
> viewer (BMP, PCX, GIF, PNG, JPG and WMF)."

Thank you. :)
I will try that.

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Laaca

Czech republic,
03.09.2013, 08:43

@ ron

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Post reply

Yes, Blocek is able to display most .WMF files. Sometimes are however problems with never ones like these from Microsoft Office 2007.

Maybe wait with download until tomorrow. In last version is a problem with "fullscreen" button. Today evening I'll upload the fixed version.

---
DOS-u-akbar!

Laaca

Czech republic,
03.09.2013, 21:59

@ Laaca

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Post reply

I had no time to prepare normal bugfix release. I only managed to compile patched EXE.

Download http://laaca.sweb.cz/blocekexe.zip extract it and replace the original BLOCEK.EXE file.

---
DOS-u-akbar!

ron

Australia,
04.09.2013, 02:11

@ Laaca

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Post reply

> Download http://laaca.sweb.cz/blocekexe.zip extract it and
> replace the original BLOCEK.EXE file.

I got that, thank you.

Unfortunately, I have been unable to unrar the full package, neither in DOS or in any Linux that I have.

And BLOCEK.EXE alone seems not to respond to anything that I have tried. :(

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Rugxulo

Usono,
04.09.2013, 05:14

@ ron

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Post reply

> > Download http://laaca.sweb.cz/blocekexe.zip extract it and
> > replace the original BLOCEK.EXE file.
>
> I got that, thank you.
>
> Unfortunately, I have been unable to unrar the full package, neither in
> DOS or in any Linux that I have.
>
> And BLOCEK.EXE alone seems not to respond to anything that I have tried.
> :(

I grabbed this .ZIP just to see what you meant. No, there's no .RAR inside, so you must mean the full package. Which is weird, because IIRC rr's UnRAR works fine, last I checked.

Also, when I put 1.4 on iBiblio, I converted it to .7z, so you should be able to unpack that just fine, worst case scenario.

ron

Australia,
04.09.2013, 07:36

@ Rugxulo

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Post reply

> I grabbed this .ZIP just to see what you meant. No, there's no .RAR inside,
> so you must mean the full package.

Yes, I did.

> Which is weird, because IIRC rr's
> UnRAR works fine,
> last I checked.

It doesn't work with the DOS version of unrar.exe that I have, or with any of the Linux ones.

> Also, when I put 1.4 on iBiblio, I converted it to .7z, so you should be able to unpack that just fine, worst case scenario.

I got that, thank you. :)
I replaced the blocek.exe with the newer one, and with any luck I can start to experiment.

---
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Rugxulo

Usono,
07.09.2013, 17:01

@ ron

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> > Which is weird, because rr's
> > UnRAR works
> fine,
>
> It doesn't work with the DOS version of unrar.exe that I have, or with
> any of the Linux ones.

BTW, RAR 5.00 final has been released (though the new improvements are a separate incompatible format), but not for DOS.

Which exact version of unrar.exe do you have? I tested "3.80" (2008 DJGPP build) yesterday in FreeDOS with blocek.rar, it works.

I did try (again) to compile latest UnRAR (5.0.11) with DJGPP, but it bombs out on wchar_t stuff (wcscmp, etc), so I don't know what's going on. I'm not familiar with C++ enough to fix it. Our best bet overall is probably to find an old copy of unrar-3.93 sources and build that (since last RAR shareware for DOS [EMX] is 3.93). Actually, I already found 3.93 sources but haven't looked closely. Though it does still have makefile.dj (unlike latest 5.0.11, which only has generic *nix makefile). A quick diff of rr's 3.8.0 and 3.9.3 should show what's changed.

RayeR

CZ,
07.09.2013, 21:26
(edited by RayeR, 08.09.2013, 01:06)

@ Rugxulo

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> I did try (again) to compile latest UnRAR (5.0.11) with DJGPP, but it bombs
> out on wchar_t stuff (wcscmp, etc)

wchar_t type is wide char - for unicode support. I think that in windows it's fixed 2B data type, maybe you can define it as short int... But probably there will be depencies on other unicode functions so it's not good idea to compile this for dos...

UPDATE: I tried to compile unrar 3.93 and after one mod in os.hpp I was able to compile it. http://rayer.g6.cz/download/unrar.exe

---
DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

ron

Australia,
08.09.2013, 03:13

@ RayeR

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> UPDATE: I tried to compile unrar 3.93 and after one mod in os.hpp I was
> able to compile it. http://rayer.g6.cz/download/unrar.exe

That works just fine on the blocek.rar that I could not open before.

Thank you !!!!!! :)

---
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Rugxulo

Usono,
08.09.2013, 21:12

@ RayeR

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> > I did try (again) to compile latest UnRAR (5.0.11) with DJGPP, but
> > it bombs out on wchar_t stuff (wcscmp, etc)
>
> wchar_t type is wide char - for unicode support. I think that in windows
> it's fixed 2B data type, maybe you can define it as short int... But
> probably there will be depencies on other unicode functions so it's not
> good idea to compile this for dos...

Yes, defining wchar as a short int was what was previously done, but I don't know for sure when such support was dropped. It's not available in latest 5.x, which lacks all such makefiles (.bcc, .dmc, .dj, .cygmin) except a generic *nix one.

Sure, ignoring Unicode may be undesired for people who (blindly) expect every OS to handle it correctly. DOS probably can't easily, or at least DOSLFN translation tables are woefully incomplete. But better an uncompressed file with garbled name than no file at all, right? So I'd still prefer to have a (semi-modern) copy of UnRAR, if at all possible.

Though checking the diffs between 3.80 and 3.93 didn't show much, so it may not be barely worth upgrading. (If I had to guess, that's probably why no one else bothered until now.) Nevertheless, 3.93 is the last official RAR release for DOS, so I figure it might be wise to be in sync with that.

But I haven't tried compiling it yet (and honestly am afraid that rr's preferred 2.95.3 is too old for C++), and also I have no (good) place to host it. Sure, the previous 3.x ones are on iBiblio, but (so annoying) it's not technically free/libre since they forbid anyone making a RAR competitor (as if!). So I may have to ask Jim what to do, or else just host it on my own crappy website, ugh.

rr

Berlin, Germany,
09.09.2013, 18:33

@ Rugxulo

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> But I haven't tried compiling it yet (and honestly am afraid that rr's
> preferred 2.95.3 is too old for C++), and also I have no (good) place to
> host it. Sure, the previous 3.x ones are on iBiblio, but (so annoying) it's
> not technically free/libre since they forbid anyone making a RAR competitor
> (as if!). So I may have to ask Jim what to do, or else just host it on my
> own crappy website, ugh.

Of course, I could put your build to http://www.bttr-software.de/ports/ with just a minimal effort.

---
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Rugxulo

Usono,
13.09.2013, 22:46

@ rr

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> Of course, I could put your build to
> http://www.bttr-software.de/ports/ with just a minimal effort.

Since it's already in "UTIL", I should probably at least inform Jim Hall, but I don't remember if we ever discussed the licensing before.

Anyways, here's the file (.EXE and sfx and sources): unrar393.zip

I didn't change much, only three files (mostly makefile.dj but kept your previous as makefile.dj~). As RayeR mentioned, there was some minor error in os.hpp regarding ENABLE_BAD_ALLOC , but I just avoided that if _DJGPP [sic] is defined. None of the changes affect any other targets, so there's no need for a diff.

I used DJGPP 2.04 /beta/ and G++ 4.8.1 with -O2 (.exe) and -Os (sfx), respectively. And CWSDPMI r7 is bound to both. I'm not sure it'd be worth using older versions just for smaller size when it may be more beneficial to be modern (faster). I used -march=pentium -mtune=generic .

There weren't many upstream changes except some minor cleanups. A lot of "int"s were replace by "size_t", so (very blind guess) "maybe"?? it'll work better for 4 GB files (on supporting DOS compatibles, of course, which excludes WinXP and FreeDOS, but Win98??? Dunno).

There is also one added option, "ai" (Ignore file attributes).

rr

Berlin, Germany,
02.11.2018, 20:40

@ Rugxulo

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> Anyways, here's the file (.EXE and sfx and sources):
> unrar393.zip
>
> I didn't change much, only three files (mostly makefile.dj but kept your
> previous as makefile.dj~). As RayeR mentioned, there was some minor
> error in os.hpp regarding ENABLE_BAD_ALLOC , but I just avoided that if
> _DJGPP [sic] is defined. None of the changes affect any other targets, so
> there's no need for a diff.

FYI: RARLab still has https://www.rarlab.com/rar/unrarsrc-3.9.10.tar.gz and https://www.rarlab.com/rar/rarx393.exe.

> I used DJGPP 2.04 /beta/ and G++ 4.8.1 with -O2 (.exe) and -Os (sfx),
> respectively. And CWSDPMI r7 is bound to both. I'm not sure it'd be worth
> using older versions just for smaller size when it may be more beneficial
> to be modern (faster). I used -march=pentium -mtune=generic .

Did you ever test if using other GCC versions or -march/-mtune settings makes any difference in performance while unpacking?
("unrarsrc-3.9.10.tar.gz" can be build with GCC up to the latest DJGPP version 8.20.)

---
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Rugxulo

Usono,
03.11.2018, 03:19

@ rr

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> FYI: RARLab still has
> https://www.rarlab.com/rar/unrarsrc-3.9.10.tar.gz and
> https://www.rarlab.com/rar/rarx393.exe.

To me he seemed to say that all old code had security vulnerabilities and would be thrown away eventually. Besides, these old versions won't unpack newer archives, only legacy ones.

> > I used DJGPP 2.04 /beta/ and G++ 4.8.1 with -O2 (.exe) and -Os (sfx),
> > respectively. And CWSDPMI r7 is bound to both. I'm not sure it'd be
> worth
> > using older versions just for smaller size when it may be more
> beneficial
> > to be modern (faster). I used -march=pentium -mtune=generic .
>
> Did you ever test if using other GCC versions or -march/-mtune settings
> makes any difference in performance while unpacking?
> ("unrarsrc-3.9.10.tar.gz" can be build with GCC up to the latest DJGPP
> version 8.20.)

No, speed wasn't a huge factor for me. I don't have lots of RAR archives to test anyways, nor do I have a lot of diverse cpus either. In theory, I'd be curious about 486 (alignment sensitive) or Atom (in-order?) builds. IIRC, Atom was first supported in GCC 4.5.0. Not sure what else would be interesting, Pentium 4?

rr

Berlin, Germany,
04.11.2018, 13:43

@ Rugxulo

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> > FYI: RARLab still has
> > https://www.rarlab.com/rar/unrarsrc-3.9.10.tar.gz and
> > https://www.rarlab.com/rar/rarx393.exe.
>
> To me he seemed to say that all old code had security vulnerabilities and
> would be thrown away eventually. Besides, these old versions won't unpack
> newer archives, only legacy ones.

I built https://www.rarlab.com/rar/unrarsrc-4.2.4.tar.gz using GCC 8.20. A version for testing is available from https://www.bttr-software.de/tmp/unrar424dos.zip.

---
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rr

Berlin, Germany,
04.05.2019, 19:50

@ rr

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> I built https://www.rarlab.com/rar/unrarsrc-4.2.4.tar.gz using
> GCC 8.20. A version for testing is available from
> https://www.bttr-software.de/tmp/unrar424dos.zip.

Hi!

Today I had no problems to extract a 800 MB archive I created using RAR 2.50 for DOS back in 2008.
I also extracted an archive created using (command-line) WinRAR 5.71 x86. (As this is UNRAR 4.2x I'm unable to extract archives in RAR 5.0 format. So one has to use rar a -ma4 archive files when creating new archives on Windows/Linux/...)

Extraction was done in vanilla MS-DOS 6.22 running inside Virtual PC 2007.

Did anyone else try?

---
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RayeR

CZ,
09.09.2013, 19:27

@ Rugxulo

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> But better an
> uncompressed file with garbled name than no file at all, right? So I'd
> still prefer to have a (semi-modern) copy of UnRAR, if at all possible.

Yes, maybe it would be possible to write few functions that do some dummy unicode to ascii translation for filanemes...

---
DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

Zyzzle

09.09.2013, 23:23

@ RayeR

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> Yes, maybe it would be possible to write few functions that do some dummy
> unicode to ascii translation for filanemes...

I had a feeling damn unicode (incompatibility with DOS) was holding back a modern variant (ie, version 4 or 5 of unrar.exe). Just map to the current codepage for filename translation and be done with it. We don't need unicode for DOS at all! At least to me it seems bloated when compared to 8-bit ASCII.

If you can accomplish this using dummy unicode-ASCII translation code, you will have greatly extended the functionality of RAR which should have universal decompression support (DOS, Win32, Win64, Linux, UNIX, etc, etc) in its modern versions!

By the way: Your compile of 3.93 works very well for me and is appreciated.
Sorry to hijack the thread.

ron

Australia,
08.09.2013, 01:54

@ Rugxulo

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> Which exact version of unrar.exe do you have?

Unrar v2.06 for DOS.
I haven't found anything more recent than that, but I haven't had the need to until now.

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glennmcc

North Jackson, Ohio (USA),
08.09.2013, 18:42

@ ron

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> > Which exact version of unrar.exe do you have?
>
> Unrar v2.06 for DOS.
> I haven't found anything more recent than that, but I haven't had the need
> to until now.

Don't need it now that v3.93 has been made available by RayeR

But....

http://www.freedos.org/software/?prog=unrar

---
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Laaca

Czech republic,
14.09.2013, 09:24

@ glennmcc

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

I use console version of WinRAR (RAR.EXE) in version 3.51 (it must be run with HX-DOS, of course)

Earlier I used native DOS+O2/2 port but it sometimes destroyed long file names (when were in LFN subdirectories) even with DOSLFN loaded.

I also tried to use some newer version that 3.51 but it didn't work for me with HX-DOS. (but I am pretty sure that more detailed testing would find some more modern compatible version)

---
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RayeR

CZ,
14.09.2013, 15:36

@ Laaca

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> I also tried to use some newer version that 3.51 but it didn't work for me
> with HX-DOS. (but I am pretty sure that more detailed testing would find
> some more modern compatible version)

Did you tried my 3.93 native DOS build?

---
DOS gives me freedom to unlimited HW access.

Laaca

Czech republic,
14.09.2013, 19:03

@ RayeR

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> Did you tried my 3.93 native DOS build?

No, I didn't. You have UNRAR unly, so only decompression is possible. (at least I think so)
I prefer to have a fullfeatured RAR program.

---
DOS-u-akbar!

Rugxulo

Usono,
14.09.2013, 20:24

@ Laaca

RAR + UnRAR

Post reply

> > Did you tried my 3.93 native DOS build?
>
> No, I didn't. You have UNRAR unly, so only decompression is possible. (at
> least I think so)
> I prefer to have a fullfeatured RAR program.

Last "RARX" (DOS+OS/2 via EMX) is 3.93 from 2010. It is considered "obsolete" to them, and I can't even (directly) find a link to it anymore without searching with Google:

http://www.rarlab.com/rarold.htm
ftp://ftp.rarlab.com/rar/rarx393.exe

EMX itself is quite old (circa 2001), and if I had to guess, they probably used old GCC 2.8.1 (1998), which was the last full (C/C++) version that supported DOS+OS/2. Newer EMX-ish builds of GCC are OS/2 only, AFAICT.

Honestly, I'm surprised they stuck to EMX for so long. I guess they really really wanted (some partial native) OS/2 support. I can only assume that newer GCC (DJGPP) is also much stricter in C++, so maybe it wouldn't compile as easily.

A weak attempt at rebuliding UnRAR with OpenWatcom didn't work. (Presumably that Win32 output would work better under HX. Yes, I also tried pre-existing 3.91 binary, didn't work either.)

Latest RAR only seems to officially support four platforms: Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, OS X. If you want to continue using RAR, that's fine, but you will have to use older archive formats (2.9? 4.x? dunno) if you intend for other systems to be able to unpack it.

DOS386

11.09.2013, 04:33

@ ron

Methan-Files (again)

Post reply

> Does anybody know of a DOS application that can render, or convert to another codec,
> Windows metafiles: image/x-wmf, image/x-emf ?

Hadn't we already discussed this 2+1/2 years ago ?

PS: WMF/EMF is not really a codec ... also results on XP do differ from ME :-P

> I've never had the need, but your best bets will be Nconvert or Image Alchemy
> commandline. I think Nconvert 5.70 has a dos binary

EMF and WMF support in NCONVERT isn't native ... neither the DOS binary
nor the Win32 binary via HX will work.

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ron

Australia,
11.09.2013, 07:33

@ DOS386

Methan-Files (again)

Post reply

> Hadn't we already discussed this 2+1/2 years ago ?

Yes, we did.
As I said: "I know I have asked this before, but there is still a need."

I haven't found anything in the meantime, and I wondered if anyone else had.
The only dumb question is the one you didn't ask.

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Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles (Users)

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

Any DOS application for Windows Metafiles

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

RAR + UnRAR

Methan-Files (again)

Methan-Files (again)