JdeBP's 32-bit Command Interpreter

The Command Interpreter version 1.1 is a Pure 32-bit replacement for the 16-bit CMD that is supplied with IBM OS/2, allowing one to finally replace one of the 16-bit vestiges that remains in OS/2 Warp. It comprises the interpreter engine proper, and a set of "front end" programs that present various user interfaces ("glass TTY", console, and Presentation Manager) that allow commands to be entered.

The command interpreter has the things that one would expect an OS/2 command interpreter to have:

* the ability to run scripts in the CMD language (a.k.a. "batch files"),

* the ability to run scripts in the REXX language,

* long filename and deep directory tree support,

* the ability to have multiple commands on a single line, and

* the ability to have command pipelines.

The command interpreter supports several enhancements that are not in IBM's 16-bit CMD, such as:

* implicit environment variables (including %_DATE% and %_TIME%),

* easily nested command scripts,

* many built in commands moved out of the command interpreter to be external (and thus easily replaceable rather than "hard wired") commands,

* configurable path searching with PATH and PATHEXT,

* subroutines (gosub/return), and

* directory stacks.

Also bundled in the package is a suite of ancillary utilities:

ANSI, AtDown, Beep, BrightBG, BunchUp, Cls, CmdLoad, Colour, Copy, CopyPlus, CopyStd, Date, Del, Delay, Describe, Detach, Dir, EchoDot, Echos, Erase, Free, HelpMsg, KeyLocks, Label, Lines, MD, MkDir, More, MoreStd, Move, Pause, PrintEnv, RD, Rem, Ren, Rename, RmDir, Start, Time, TrueName, Type, Vol, WPSArc, and ZDir.

( Some utilities - and the "front end" to the command interpreter with the console user interface - require the runtime libraries of JdeBP's 32-bit Unicode Console API for OS/2. )