man, I miss my BATchfiles in DOS 3.3 - 6.22 :)

Since we are talking ancient history here anyone remember the comodor and basic.

Fred Flintstone has us all beat, he did all his computing using a rock monitor and whatever was inside of the rock chassis.

Or the Attari computer?  God I am old lol I even remember the IBM uniden I think it was called, an old punch card machine.

I started with the card punch programming in BASIC, then onto the TRS80, 286, Lotus 1-2-3, dbase, etc.  I still use DOS and have written batch files in the very recent past.  I'm still hanging onto and using WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS.  In every operating system upgrade it's another challenge to get it to work.  I didn't see Edlin mentioned.  Any old Edlin users out there?  

Yeah, I tried Edlin a few times; moved to PC-Write for DOS 3.02.

man im always creating batch files for automated tasks but i also utilize WMIC into my batch file scripts as well.

This is one of my better ones for automating the installation of Symantec Endpoint before i installed our new AV.

it could be deployed through GPO under the machine account so when they login it does it all for them.

To uninstall remotely you could copy this script to their C:\ drive and then use "wmic /node:PCName process call create C:\SymantecEndPoint_Remover.bat"

@echo off
set txtfile=C:\%computername%_SymantecGUID.txt
IF NOT EXIST %txtfile% (wmic product where name="Symantec Endpoint Protection" get identifyingnumber | find /i "{" >> %txtfile%) ELSE (    
    DEL %txtfile%    
    ping -n 5 127.0.0.1 > null
    wmic product where name="Symantec Endpoint Protection" get identifyingnumber | find /i "{" >> %txtfile%
    ECHO DONE Getting GUID.....
    )

    ECHO Uninstalling LiveUpdate
    IF EXIST ("C:\Program Files (x86)\Symantec\LiveUpdate\LSETUP.EXE") DO (
    %comspec% /c "C:\Program Files (x86)\Symantec\LiveUpdate\LSETUP.EXE" /u /q
    ) ELSE (
    %comspec% /c "C:\Program Files\Symantec\LiveUpdate\LSETUP.EXE" /q /u
           )


    ECHO Starting uninstall in 5 seconds....
    ping -n 5 127.0.0.1 > null

FOR /F "tokens=1 delims=" %%A in (%txtfile%) DO (
    echo Running msiexec /X %%A /qb
    %comspec% /c MsiExec.exe /X %%A /qn /norestart
)
::del C:\SymantecEndPoint_Remover.bat
del %txtfile%
del null
 

Edited by JohnnyJammer, 23 February 2016 - 04:50 PM.

Within Windows 3.1 - Windows for Workgroups 3.11, I used DOS 3.3 - DOS 6.22.  I loved using my BATchfiles. I kept them all.  Does anyone remember:  If exist...  if not exist... choice  and so on?  After I had to goto Windows 95 & beyond, close to all batchfiles fell to the wayside  

write your own:

"http://gobruen.com/progs/dos_batch/dos_batch.html"

I started with the card punch programming in BASIC, then onto the TRS80, 286, Lotus 1-2-3, dbase, etc.  I still use DOS and have written batch files in the very recent past.  I'm still hanging onto and using WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS.  In every operating system upgrade it's another challenge to get it to work.  I didn't see Edlin mentioned.  Any old Edlin users out there?  

One of my favorite DOS program was PC-Write 3.01, and later PC-Write 4.0.  Within my three Windows XP Modes [within W7pro] I have been able to get working one of my first computer program license:  PC-Bible for DOS, versions 1 or 2 and version 3.  I had a batchfile that would call up the parameters needed and then the program itself, one for PCW and one for PCBible.

Edited by RolandJS, 18 August 2016 - 06:33 PM.

Never liked Edlin. Even RSX-11 had full screen editors...

Wordstar user 35+ years now, started with CP/m, then to DOS 2 and CP/m-86, still use it for writing code under XP, 98se, Dos 7.1, and FreeDOS. For batch files- end up writing a program to generate .BAT files and spawn them.

Anyone else using DOS extenders these days? Phar Lap gets a lot of use with me.

Edited by BrianVS, 08 September 2016 - 04:23 PM.

I mix C++ and windows console batch scripts.  I am not a master of the "batch".  I fake it.  I use fopen to see if files exist and use return codes.  Why?  I just do.

i still have a Timex Sinclair 1000 (TS1000) and a Amiga 500.  they both still rock.

Yeah yeah, I like that generation of machines too.  That is because there were a lot of indie shareware developers that were involved with them.  Now a days everyone is almost required to be from a software development house.  Indie software is just institutional grade.

At my 1st job using computers, they used to call me "Batch File Billy" because I discovered batch files.  The manufacturer of the machines we used left behind a few rudimentary batch files and we used them for a couple of years without knowing anything about them until one day I discovered "Notepad" and opened one up.  There was hardly anything there, so then the goal became to add more stuff.  So I discovered "commands" and "command line" and "switches" and all sorts of stuff and that is when I realized that the manufacturer really kind of screwed us because with a little bit more effort they could have given us a lot more functionality and saved us a lot of time. Example we were hand copying files by the dozen one at a time from local computers to the network computer when a batchfile could have done them all at the end of the day.

So I wrote one and it worked.

And I used it when I was on the evening shift for a few weeks and when my partner and I switched and I went to Day Shift I told him about my time-saving batch file and he thought it was a good idea and so he used it for a few days until he told his brother on a different machine and his partner was named ROBERT and as soon as ROBERT found out I had initiated something new and "unauthorized" he went squealing like a pig to the Worst Production Manager in the World (our Boss) and ratted me out like the stool pigeon he was.

Was I rewarded?  Promoted?  Given a raise?  A pat on the back?  No, no, no and no.  I was given an "informal verbal warning" and was told that it could become a "formal verbal warning" and from there a "written warning" if I did not stop with my HOT, BATCH FILE ACTION.

This, btw was the beginning of my entrepreneurial and self-employed identity.  I always feel weird when some politician says something like how we need to help people that don't have jobs find jobs and become employees because I really hate employees. All of them.  Lazy, stupid, and back-stabbing low-lifes.  Every time I read a story about "work place violence" I always hope that the perpetrator got the worst ones first before he was killed "in a hail of gunfire by law enforcement officers".

So yeah, the OP knows me.  I also have the nostalgia for the good 'ol days of batch files.  So much so that I figured out how to use one and thought I'd post it here.  This is a maintance routine that I would use on one of my client's computer systems after their Server started showing hard drive errors.  The idea was, instead of leaving the Server on all night long for no reason, and leave it exposed to possible hack attempts on the internet, to shut it down each night at a safe hour, say 8:00 pm, and to schedule a chkdsk to run each morning when "Scheduler" turned it back on.  Either the HD would fail or the HD errors would disappear.  Once I started running chkdsk every morning, we never saw a single HD error ever again.

So here's the little script I used on a Win2000 Server, in conjunction with the native Windows "Task Manager" or whatever that scheduler program is:

echo y | chkdsk.exe c: /r
shutdown.exe -r -t 01 -f -c "Routine Daily Shutdown"

If I remember right, the "echo y" was to answer the MS pop-up window "Are you sure you want to shut down?" or maybe it was to answer the chkdsk pop-up "Are you sure" (that you want to run chkdsk).  I'm just posting it to give an example of how a batch file can still be used today no matter what the Operating System.  Now that I think of it, I wonder if I could have shut-down both the Modem and the Wireless router at the same time I sent the Server down, in order to prevent/reduce the window of opportunity for hack attempts on those components also.

Thanks everyone for adding their experiences, past and present!  One ancient rumor I heard or read was that Bill Gates' early early DOS owes a little bit more than a nod to C/PM