creating an app which can run under DOS

[BlackRose]

HI,
Can I create an exe which can run under DOS and how that?
I need and example if yes, plz.
thanks.

[jritchie]

What do you mean by run under DOS? VB 5 and up require a 32bit environment which means at least Win95 for FAT32 file allocations etc. Also VB seems to be merged fairly solidly into windows, dlls, ocx etc. Haven't yet managed to generate a project which doesn't require at least one windows dll/ocx.

Not much help i know :( <- only just got shown how to do this in another message

[FMillion]

There is a tutorial somewhere telling how to make a console-mode app. That allows a program to be run in a text mode, but it still doesn't let it run from a DOS prompt. I also need to know how to make a program run in the SAME DOS window from which it is executed. I know console-mode is possible since somebody already has made a tutorial on this site.

[Gimpster]

The whole basis of Visual Basic is the visual part. Which means making GUI apps. Not the old dos apps. You can't do it with VB because VB is designed specifically for making Windows applications. In fact, as far as I know, you can't even make apps for OS's like Unix or Linux with VB. If you want to make DOS apps, then learn C or C++. And make sure you don't use Visual C++ to write the programs, or you'll run into problems. Because it is also designed to make Windows apps.

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Ryan

[Smithy006]

yep. There all right. You can only compile a VB app to win32 executable format. VB doesn't support 16-bit compiles for formats such as DOS. VB is an easy langauge but when it comes to developing on other platforms it useless. One alternative is to write your program in QBASIC. You can create DOS programs using that. see qbasic.com for a tonne of examples etc.

[jritchie]

Out of interest, yes you can actually create a vb app to run in a DOS window on a 32 bit machine, (or if you have an older version of vb 16 bit..or if you have vb version 1.0 for DOS no problems we actually found this relic in a cupboard and have just finish a small test and it does run on a 286 without windows...enough digression), as long as you don't expect to see windows etc. Have built an interface between mvBase and Excel which gets called in DOS with no Problems.

There is a version of Delphi being developed in Germany which apparently will allow ports of Delphi apps to Unix/Linux. Guess Apple misses out, although the rumour is Apple OS 9 will be built a unix platform. :)

Oops that last part was meant to go into another window l have open :o

[This message has been edited by jritchie (edited 01-06-2000).]

[This message has been edited by jritchie (edited 01-06-2000).]

[Clunietp]

Console-mode application creation via VB -- here at VB-WORLD:
http://www.vb-world.net/articles/console/