--------------------------------------------
Copyright (C) 1987, the Disk Doctor.
First published in the Rochester (PC)^3 News:
Picture City PC Programming Club
PO BOX 20342
Rochester, NY 14602
The Disk Doctor may be contacted at this
address, or via CIS [73147,414].
This material may be reproduced for internal
use by other not-for-profit groups, provided
this copyright notice is included.
----------------------------------------------
[In the last issue, the Disk Doctor was
helping X., who accidentally formatted his
hard disk.]
2:55pm
It was X's boss, Mr. Y. "I just heard how
you restored X's files. We got back just
about all the super important files. I
guess we're fortunate to have someone here
with your training. Thank you for helping
us out there."
"You're welcome. I am always happy to be
of service."
"X. had a lot of important corporate
records on his computer. When he
accidently formatted his hard disk, he
could have lost it all."
"Don't be too hard on him. It was a
honest mistake. He went to format a
floppy disk, typed the command `FORMAT',
and simply forgot to add the drive letter
'A:'. When he read the warning message
and saw he was about to format the wrong
drive, he tried to get out of it by
pressing the ESC key. Unfortunately, only
Break will abort that operation."
I continued, "If you want to fault him for
anything, get on his case to start making
frequent backups. You know what I always
say, 'If you can't afford to lose it, ...'
".
"'...you can't afford NOT to back it up!'" Mr. Y finished my line. "Even so,
I just don't know how anyone could be so
careless."
"It's an easy mistake to make. After a
while all of us get sloppy. You get in
the habit of pressing Enter, and ignore
the warning message. Why, I came close to
formatting my disk a number of times."
"Even you, Doctor?"
"Even me," I let out a sigh. "FORMATting
your hard disk is just an accident waiting
to happen."
2:57pm
"Why doesn't IBM put some kind of
protection in the FORMAT command?"
"The newer versions of DOS do contain a
special confirmation message, to warn you
when you are about to format a hard drive.
You have to answer 'Y' to continue,
instead of simply striking any key."
"Well, there still are a lot of us using
our original version of DOS. Doctor,
isn't there some way we can prevent this
problem from ever recurring?"
"Most Bulletin Boards have instructions
for patches, so you can modify FORMAT.COM
using DEBUG."
Mr. Y. shook his head. "I never used
DEBUG."
"Okay then, there are several safeguard
products available." I recited a couple
names: Norton, MACE, PC-TOOLS, and some
public domain utilities. "They copy the
F.A.T. information elsewhere on the disk,
so you can always recover from damage to
the F.A.T. Just stick one in your
AUTOEXEC.BAT and it protects you
automatically every time you boot up."
"But we're not going to run out and buy
everyone a utility, just to prevent a
once-in-a-lifetime mistake. I want
something we can use company-wide. Isn't
there something simple we can all use?"
2:59pm
I thought about it for a moment. "The
simplest solution, is to delete FORMAT.COM
off your hard disk all together. Then,
whenever you open a new box of diskettes,
format them all at once, using the FORMAT
command off your DOS disk."
Mr. Y smirked. I could see he didn't like
that approach, so I continued, "Here's
another idea that's more convenient.
Rename FORMAT.COM to something like
WATCHOUT.COM . That way, you'll never use
it without thinking twice."
"In fact," I had an idea, "if you write a
FORMAT.BAT batch file, that would prevent
you from formatting the wrong drive."
"Can you show me how to write a batch
file? Or better yet, why don't you write
it down, and I'll put it in our user group
newsletter, so everyone will read it."
"Ok." I said, then I reconsidered. "We
can get people to read it, but how can we
get people to take action on it?"
"That's my job," Mr. Y. smiled with a
powerful grin. "I guarantee everybody who
works for me will do it."
=========================================
Prevent Accidental Formatting of C:
by the Disk Doctor
--------------------------------------------
Copyright (C) 1987, the Disk Doctor.
First published in the Rochester (PC)^3 News:
Picture City PC Programming Club
PO BOX 20342
Rochester, NY 14602
The Disk Doctor may be contacted at this
address, or via CIS [73147,414].
This material may be reproduced for internal
use by other not-for-profit groups, provided
this copyright notice is included.
----------------------------------------------
We are going to create a FORMAT.BAT. The
first step is to rename FORMAT.COM. This
is necessary because a batch file has
lower precedence than a .COM program by
the same name.
If you are a new user, or someone else set
up your machine for you, you may need help
finding the file FORMAT.COM. If you know
where to find it, skip the next paragraph.
Display your path environment by entering
the command 'PATH' . The response may
list several sub-directories, like this:
'PATH=C:\;C:\DOS;C:\MENU;... '.
Most people keep all their DOS commands in
one sub-directory named \DOS or \SYSTEM or
something like that. These commands are
always available, no matter where you are,
via the PATH link.
Examine the various sub-directories where
you expect to find DOS commands. You can
do this with the command:
'DIR \SYSTEM\FORMAT.COM' (or whatever).
Change to this sub-directory with the
command 'CHDIR \SYSTEM' (or whatever).
Rename this file to something omenous.
'REN FORMAT.COM WATCHOUT.COM'.
Create a batch file in this directory with
the command:
'EDLIN FORMAT.BAT'.
Type 'I' for insert, and enter the
following:
ECHO OFF
REM THIS COMMAND WILL ONLY FORMAT A:
IF A:==1% GOTO OKAY
IF a:==1% GOTO OKAY
ECHO YOU FORGOT TO SPECIFY THE DRIVE LETTER...
ECHO THIS MISTAKE COULD FORMAT YOUR HARD-DISK.
ECHO IN THE FUTURE, BE MORE CAREFUL.
ECHO NOW RE-ENTER THE COMMAND CORRECTLY.
GOTO DONE
:OKAY
WATCHOUT %1 %2 %3
:DONE
After you have entered these lines, press
Ctrl-ScrollLock(Break), then 'E' to exit
EDLIN and save this batch file.
As written above, FORMAT.BAT will only
allow you to format drive A:. If you have
a second floppy drive, you may want to
insert after the fourth line:
IF B:==1% GOTO OKAY
IF b:==1% GOTO OKAY
If you do intend to format any another
drive, you can also invoke the renamed
command directly: 'WATCHOUT B:'.
From now on, when you type 'FORMAT', it
will invoke this batch file instead of the
original FORMAT command. Any time you
leave off the parameters (the drive letter
to be formatted), you will get an error
message instead.
If you use the /S or other options, be
sure to put them last on the command line,
or FORMAT.BAT will give you a nasty
message and FORMAT will not run properly.
NOTE: I have written FORMAT.BAT to force
you to enter the command correctly. I
could have simply ignored the error and
proceeded to format drive A:, but I
believe users should be educated, not
shielded from their mistakes. If you get
in the habit of leaving off the drive
letter, one day you will make this
mistake on someone else's machine, someone
without FORMAT.BAT protection. Let's be
safe and learn to do it right.
REMEMBER: The single best insurance
against all types of disk problems is
frequent, thorough backups.
