
                          HISTORY FILE FOR WCL
                          --------------------
Version 7.40a (May 1994)
-----------------------

Fixed a little bug which resulted in an error message in a dialog box
appearing twice.



Version 7.40 (May 1994)
-----------------------

CHANGES HAVE BEEN MADE TO SETTINGS IN WCL.INI
*********************************************

 1. The effect of the "WINDOW-BORDER" setting in WCL.INI has been
    changed. It should now be turned ON normally. If it is turned OFF,
    then the WCL window ("small" version only) will have no title bar,
    no minimize button, and no system menu - and it will not be moveable.

 2. The effect of the "WINDOWHEIGHT.BIG" setting has been changed. Before,
    it determined both the height of the BIGWCL window and the scroll back
    buffer size. Now it only determines the height of the BIGWCL window
    (i.e., the default height of the window, when the program is started
    - it can always be resized afterward). BIGWCL has some internal
    defaults depending on driver resolution.

    When you exit BIGWCL, the current height of the window is saved in
    this setting - so you can just resize the window to whatever suits
    you, and then type "SAVE", or just quit and start the program again.

 3. A new entry in WCL.INI - "WINDOWHEIGHT" has been introduced. This
    determines the height of the "small" WCL window. Similar principles
    apply to this setting as to "WINDOWHEIGHT.BIG" (above).

 4. A new entry in WCL.INI - "INSERT-MODE" has been introduced.
    If this is turned ON, then the default state of the insert mode in the
    doskey emulation will be ON (instead of the normal default to over-
    write mode).

 5. A new entry in WCL.INI - "US-DATE-FORMAT" has been introduced.
    This is to allow the date and time stamps on files to be listed
    in the American format (mm/dd/yy) instead of the default (dd/mm/yy).

 6. A new entry - "DIRCMD" has been added to WCL.INI, for greater
    compatibility with DOS. Any switch which is valid for the DIR
    command can be put in this setting, and such switches will
    automatically be applied to all DIR commands.

    e.g
          DIRCMD=/L /OD

     to do the DIR listing in lowercase letters, and sort by date.


OTHER NEW FEATURES
******************
Apart from more than 100 internal enhancements, there are several new
features in this release;

1. A configuration program (WCLCFG.EXE) is now provided. This saves
   having to make changes to the WCL.INI file manually. It covers most,
   but not all, of the possible settings in the INI file.

2. You can now assign a command to Ctrl-C (formerly it was not allowed).
   CTRL-C is set in the KEYS.WCL file to "EXIT" by default. You can
   change this by editing the file.

3. WCL will now save the last co-ordinates of the WCL window (this works for
   both the "big" and "small" versions), and also optionally save the
   Windows desktop, when you quit from the system menu, or by pressing
   Alt-F4 (i.e., assuming that the Save-Desktop feature is ON, and that WCL
   is the Windows shell).

4. The "PROMPT" command has been revamped for greater compatibility with
   the DOS "prompt" command. It can now take parameters such as
    $T, $D, $V, $Q, and $L, in addition to $P and $G.

5. The "DECODE" command is now much faster than before. Both the ENCODE
   and DECODE commands can now handle Unix format UUencoded files. To
   UUencode a file in the Unix format, use the new command "UNIXENCODE".
   Unix files are decoded automatically with the "DECODE" command.

6. An interface has been provided to WCL to allow Windows programmers to
   add user extensions to the internal command set. The interface files
   and documentation are in WCL_EXT.ZIP, which is now supplied as part
   of the WCL package. This interface has resulted in the addition of
   another DLL (WCL_EXT.WXX) to the package. The interface is provided
   "AS IS" - so use it at your own risk.

7. The maximum number of COMMAND ALIASES has been increased from 30
   to 40.

8. The maximum number of lines in WCL batch files (.CBF files) has been
   increased from 30 to 150.

9. A *limited* subset of the Unix FOREACH command has been introduced,
   for operations involving multiple files, without resorting to creating
   batch files, or to transimtting commands one by one.

    RESTRICTION: this command is only supported in BIGWCL.EXE. See fuller
    documentation in the help file.

10. A limited subset of the GREP command has been introduced - to search
    for strings inside a text file.

    The syntax is GREP [-n -c -v] <search string> <file specs>

11. The "TYPE" command (to display the contents of a file) can now take
    wilcards (eg TYPE *.TXT).

12. The "REN" command has been revamped in many ways.
     [a] It can now be used to rename files and directories whose names
         are regarded as illegal by DOS (eg because they have spaces in
         their names). In such cases, enclose the SOURCE file name in
         quotes - eg REN "FRED DY" FREDDY

     [b] It can now take wildcards - but you MUST use the wildcards
         in both the SOURCE and TARGET file names
              eg REN *.DOC *.TXT
                 REN WCL*.TXT *.WCL

         -  the TARGET file name in such cases MUST be a wildcard that
            begins with "*".

                eg REN WCL*.TXT FRED*.TXT   - this is NOT valid.

13. A new command "DU" (for "disk usage") has been introduced. This
    command tells you how much disk space is occupied by the files in
    a directory (and all its subdirectories), without going through a
    directory listing. The command can take one parameter - the name
    of the directory whose disk usage you want. If "DU" is typed
    without any parameter, it will process the current directory.

14. A new switch for the "DIR" command has been introduced. This is
    "/Q" - for "quick" display. When this switch is used, the default
    behaviour of pausing for a keypress after each screen is overridden.

15. A new command "REPLACE" has been introduced. This is for searching
    for a string in an ASCII file, and replacing all occurences of that
    string with another one.

    Please do NOT attempt to use this command on a binary file.

16. A bug in the scolling on the command line has been fixed.

17. Support has been introduced for associating file extensions with
    an application. If you type the name of a file at the WCL prompt,
    and the file's extension has an application associated with it in
    the "Extensions" section of WIN.INI, WCL will execute the relevant
    application, with the file loaded.

18. Limited support for filename completion has been added. If the user
    types part of a file/directory name and then presses TAB, WCL will
    attempt to complete the file/directory name from the list of files
    and directories in the CURRENT directory.

    Note that this feature only works if both the DOSKEY emulation and
    command-line editing are enabled.

19. Changes have been made to the way in which the STARTUP lines in WCL.INI
    and the AUTOEXEC.CBF file are handled. Formerly, the programs on the
    STARTUP lines, and the AUTOEXEC.CBF file were only executed if WCL was
    the Windows SHELL. From this version, they will be executed, when WCL
    is started, whether or not WCL is the Windows SHELL.

20. Automatic directory changing ("implied CD") has been introduced.
    If you type the name of a directory at the WCL command line, and
    then add a backslash to it, the program will attempt to change
    to that directory, without your having to type "CD" first. In this
    respect, WCL first searches the "path", and then the whole disk, for
    a matching directory. If you have a large/slow disk, this may take
    some time.

21. The scroll bars have now been removed from the "small" WCL window.
    What is left now is a much smaller window, which is even less
    unobstrusive. The window can now be resized (reduced in size) to
    as small as you want.


22. A new command "WMCLOSE" has been introduced. This command shuts WCL
    down, WITHOUT ANY QUESTION. Some users have complained about being
    asked whether they really want to quit. This command is for such users.
    It is also useful for closing down WCL from a non-interactive batch
    file.

    You may even create a command alias for it, using the name of any of
    the WCL exit commands - and this will then take priority;

     e.g. NEWCOMMAND ESC WMCLOSE

     with this command alias, anytime you press ESC, WCL will close without
     further reference to you.


Version 7.30a (March 1994)
--------------------------
Fixed a bug in the search engine for the SEEK command which sometimes
led to a truncation in the display of the names of directories. This
bug also affected the DIR/S command.




Version 7.30 (March 1994)
--------------------------
New features;

  1. WCL now has an UNZIP feature - to extract files from ZIP archives
     created by PKZIP and other ZIP utilities. This feature is based
     on freeware source code produced by the Internet INFO-ZIP group.
     This is implemented by the new "UNZIP" command.

  2. A new command "RUNDOS" has been introduced. Sometimes, users
     experience some problems with some DOS programs. A typical situation
     is a case where the user is trying to pass some parameters to a DOS
     program (e.g., to redirect output from the DOS program to a file).
     If you have persistent problems with running a particular DOS
     program through WCL, and nothing else works, try the RUNDOS command.

     This is used by typing "RUNDOS" before the name of the program to
     be executed. What this does is to call your DOS command interpreter
     (i.e., the "COMSPEC" environment variable) and then pass to it
     anything that appears after the "RUNDOS" command. This is in effect
     equal to running the program from the DOS prompt.

  3. A new file WCLCODE2.DLL has been added to the package.

  4. You can now have a choice of fonts in the "small" WCL window, through
     a new setting in the INI file, "DEFAULT-FONT".

  5. You can now give the main the "small" WCL window a border, through a
     new setting in the INI file, "WINDOW-BORDER". When the window has a
     border, it can be resized, to REDUCE its WIDTH only.



Version 7.20 (March 1994)
--------------------------
New features;
  1. WCL can now UUencode and UUdecode files. There are 2 new commands

      ENCODE - UUencodes a file
      DECODE - UUdecodes a file

   Each of them takes only ONE parameter - the name of the file to encode
   or decode. The DECODE command is a bit slow - but there you are.
   Thanks for Robert Swart for the UUencode/decode routines.

  2. You can now print the contents of the WCL window. With BIGWCL, you use
     a new command "PRINTSCR". If this command is run without any parameter,
     the contents of the window buffer are written into an ascii file called
     BIGWCL.SCR. You can however direct output to the printer by supplying
     "LPT1" or "PRN" as a parameter, and you can direct output to another
     ascii file by supplying another file name.

        eg

          PRINTSCR               - output to BIGWCL.SCR
          PRINTSCR PRN           - ouput to the printer
          PRINTSCR SCREEN.TXT    - output to SCREEN.TXT

     This command does not work with the small windowed version, because
     there is nothing to print there. However, when you run commands like
     "DIR" from the small windowed version, a "Print Window" menu item is
     inserted into the window. Clicking on that menu item brings up a
     dialog that allows you to direct output to the printer, or to an
     ascii file called WCL.SCR.


  3. New command "EXECWAIT", or "EW" added. This is for use in running
     EXTERNAL programs through WCL batch files. What it does is to cause
     WCL to WAIT until the program being run has terminated, before running
     the next command in the batch file. To use EXECWAIT, all you need to do
     is to put it before the command that you would normally type.

     eg

       EXECWAIT NOTEPAD TEST.TXT

     You can use this command instead of the "PAUSE" and "DELAY" commands.


  4. New file WCLCODE.DLL added to the package



NOTE:
-----
From version 7.00 onwards, I will no longer be bundling the ASCII file
WCL.TXT with this package. It has become too large, and is superfluous,
since all the information therein can be found in the on-line help. The
file has been replaced in the package with WCL.SUM - a plain ASCII file
which is just an alphabetical list of the WCL internal commands. Note
that the file does not elaborate on the commands. It only LISTS them.
Full information on each command can be found in the on-line help.



[Details of early versions have been chopped out of here, because this
file was getting too big.]


(c) 1994, Dr. A. Olowofoyeku
    268 Horwood,
    Newcastle,
    Staffs ST5 5BQ
    ENGLAND.

    E-mail: 
      laa12@keele.ac.uk
      chief@mep.com

