Reading DOS Help files

benjiboy · Post by **benjiboy** » Sat Dec 17, 2005 10:22 am

Folks, I'm trying to read the various help files that come with QB 7.1. I've tried under Win2000 pro and get told they are DOS help files. I've trie it under cmd in Win2000 and get the same result

. I've trie it under Win 3.11 and get told they're DOS help files

and I've tried it under DOS 6.2 and cannot open them

Any suggestions?

MystikShadows · Post by **MystikShadows** » Sat Dec 17, 2005 10:38 am

Open the PDS and go to the help menu there

..

{Nathan} · Post by **{Nathan}** » Sat Dec 17, 2005 10:54 am

And, if you don't have PDS then you can get it at www.qbnz.com

Macric · Post by **Macric** » Sun Dec 18, 2005 2:31 am

i have swum in those waters. make the directory c:\qh, copy to that directory qh.exe and the .hlp files, run qh.exe. if you have more doubts just question again. have the best luck for you.

Antoni · Post by **Antoni** » Sun Dec 18, 2005 11:14 am

Macric: I have found qh.exe in the PDS 7.1 package. When i try to run it my W2000 says it is a noncompatible os/2 app, and hints me to try to run it with forecedos. So I forcedos qh.exe and it complains about not enough memory available.
If I forcedos mem it reports 576000 bytes ,4 Meg EMS and 16 Meg XMS. It seems it's not enough.
Have you had the same problem?

{Nathan} · Post by **{Nathan}** » Sun Dec 18, 2005 1:16 pm

Boot from a WIN98 startup disk and run it in there

Antoni · Post by **Antoni** » Sun Dec 18, 2005 1:50 pm

We could do our reader. Does anyone know of any specs on line?

Macric · Post by **Macric** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 5:03 am

Antoni wrote:When i try to run it my W2000 says it is a noncompatible os/2 app

the PDS can also work with OS/2, so the Qh.exe could be a program that can run for both, OS/2 or DOS.

Antoni wrote:If I forcedos mem it reports 576000 bytes ,4 Meg EMS and 16 Meg XMS. It seems it's not enough. Have you had the same problem?

no, i use windows98se, i am sure it's a problem with windows 2OOO.

Macric · Post by **Macric** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 5:08 am

Antoni wrote:We could do our reader. Does anyone know of any specs on line?

the Qh.exe (QuickHelp) it's the viewer from Microsoft for the Ms-Dos Help files format.

benjiboy · Post by **benjiboy** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 8:03 am

Thanks all.
I have tried all the advice given, have got a new copy of the PDS, have set up a help directory with QH.exe in it and the help files.

All to no avail.

The PDS setup fails under Win2000 when it tries to create the link libraries.
As per the other correspondent, QH generates an 'invalid DOS program' message.
So, now I'm going to try installing it all on my old 20mhz 286 Olivetti laptop and see if I can't get it to work there.
I no longer have any Win98 machines, and those running XP all seem to have developed unrecoverable OS problems. Maybe I'll rebuild a machine just to have Win98 back...

{Nathan} · Post by **{Nathan}** » Mon Dec 19, 2005 3:47 pm

Wait... arn't you just trying to run PDS? Then you just run qbx.exe if I can remember correctly... then open the help in there...

Or just open it in notepad...

Macric · Post by **Macric** » Thu Dec 22, 2005 11:50 pm

benjiboy wrote:I have tried all the advice given, have got a new copy of the PDS, have set up a help directory with QH.exe in it and the help files.
All to no avail. The PDS setup fails under Win2000 when it tries to create the link libraries. As per the other correspondent, QH generates an 'invalid DOS program' message.

most of the PDS downloads just need to be unzipped, i never use the Setup.
the .hlp files that can be read in the PDS editor are similar to the QB4.5 .hlp files plus enhancements.

the PDS editor only uses four .hlp files,
Bas7advr.hlp, Bas7ener.hlp, Bas7ex.hlp, Bas7qck.hlp

the another eight .hlp files in the Help subdirectory only can be read using the Qh.exe.
the Quickhelp has a bug, when it is run only looks for .hlp files in the directories,
C:\QH
C:\DPath
C:\Path
C:\BookShelf (this is for OS/2)
i use windows98se and i never have had any problem.

bearded_oneder · Post by **bearded_oneder** » Thu Jun 22, 2006 11:34 pm

Quick Help will really have to be run in a true DOS environment with plenty of conventional memory available.

Reading DOS help files is a no brainer. Download the DOS tools from the provided MS ftp URL, unzip them in their own 8.3 named directory. You'll find a program HELP.COM which reads DOS help files from the command line. However ... it does NOT read QUICK BASIC help files, because these have a special header for the QH program which is called from within Quick Basic.
ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/OLDDOS.EXE

As for installing Quick Basic on an XP/2000 OS. Two options:
1. Setup a Dual Boot DOS or Windows 98 partition (my choice). Install from FLOPPY DISKS. Can not install from the hard drive. Then reboot to Windows 2000/XP and Quick Basic will now run, or
2. Download a copy that someone else had installed and zipped for you. Unzip it to an 8.3 named directory, then in the Quick Basic IDE @ Options --> Set Paths, change the paths to match the 8.3 directory

Macric · Post by **Macric** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 7:14 am

Macric wrote:
Antoni wrote:When i try to run it my W2000 says it is a noncompatible os/2 app
the PDS can also work with OS/2, so the Qh.exe could be a program that can run for both, OS/2 or DOS.

today i can be sure that Quickhelp it's made for running in OS/2 and Ms-Dos, i read it in an article of the KB, it's called a Bound program.

rdc · Post by **rdc** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 8:32 am

I can run QBX on my Win2K Pro machine with no problems at all. Everything works just fine.

If you can't get it to work, you might want to try DosBox.

MystikShadows · Post by **MystikShadows** » Fri Jun 23, 2006 10:11 am

yeah PDS runs fine for me here....windows XP SP2

nkk_kan · Post by **nkk_kan** » Sun Jun 25, 2006 8:43 am

Well
why don't u rename it as qb4.5 's help file
and try to open it from qb 4.5???

i am not sure it works....but just try it....

Fumador · Post by **Fumador** » Sat Jul 29, 2006 11:40 pm

if someone of you are interested here it is a tip about the Quickhelp;
The CodePost

Pete's QBASIC Site