DeskMan/2

=========================================================================== DeskMan/2 Update Information File Version 1.51a =========================================================================== ___________________________________________ NOTE: If you are using OS/2 2.1 GA, please make sure that you have applied all available OS/2 patches and fixes before installing DeskMan/2. This specifically includes the fixes contained within 21WPSF.ZIP found on CompuServe, GEnie, OS2BBS, and elsewhere. ___________________________________________ Table of Contents ___________________________________________ Introduction Upgrading DeskMan/2 Changes in this version ___________________________________________ Introduction ___________________________________________ Best selling DeskMan/2 is the award winning "must have" enhancement for all OS/2 users. OS/2 2.0 Lead Architect, Dr. Mike Kogan, says: "DeskMan/2 dramatically improves the ability of corporations and users to get the most out of OS/2." IBM features DeskMan/2 in its "Red Book" on OS/2 configuration techniques, "Cracking" the Workplace Shell (GG24-4201-00). This fast flexible one-of-a-kind suite of multi-function tools makes it easy to use and administer OS/2, from the Personal Computer to the LAN! Install, configure, backup, secure, and otherwise manage Workplace Shell (WPS) desktops and objects remotely. Enhance productivity with virtual desktops and Workplace Shell Extensions. Authorize access to individual DeskMan/2 and WPS features on a user by user basis. Take complete control of the Workplace Shell via a simple drag & drop interface or a powerful API (including full support for CID and LAD/2). The included VUEMan/2 component provides a powerful drag & drop enabled virtual desktop, including such features as object launching, window security and management, and more! The DM/2 Image component saves and restores complete system configurations from command line and PM environments. Terrific for disaster recovery; training and demo machines; and other uses. Never lose your Desktop again! DeskMan/2 is the premier enhancement for all OS/2 users! --------------------------- All DeskMan/2 components are fully functional with OS/2 2.0 plus ServicePak 2, and later versions of OS/2. To install all DeskMan/2 components takes approximately 2.5 megabytes of hard disk storage, as well as 2.5 megabytes of temporary hard disk storage. --------------------------- DeskMan/2 is unmatched in its ability to fully maximize the multitasking power and versatility of OS/2! Incorporating the DeskMan/2 Workplace Shell Manager; the powerful VUEMan/2 virtual desktop and window manager; the potent DeskMan/2 Workplace Shell Extensions; and the DM2Image Configuration Snapshot Facility; DeskMan/2 is essential for all OS/2 users. DeskMan/2 brings new meaning to "multitasking". Using VUEMan/2, create and manage as many as 81 "virtual desktops". Virtual desktops make multi-tasking easy, allowing you to use and organize many concurrent activities with an easy to use, drag & drop, point & click user interface. It is like having up to 81 monitors that all fit right on your desk! Manage, secure, and manipulate Workplace Shell Objects like never before! DeskMan/2 makes OS/2 easy, from the PC to the LAN. Do-it-your-way desktop management plus quick and easy migration of icons, objects and desktops between systems. Create customized desktops, backup & restore desktops to the precise configuration desired, manipulate windows and objects in a virtually unlimited number of ways. Users can be presented with personalized desktops, providing them with just those choices they need or want, limiting access to other features and choices. Accidental changes to the desktop can be easily recovered, or even prevented in the first place. The Corporate Edition of DeskMan/2 includes all of this plus object based password protection, optional Workplace Shell audit trailing, and the potential for additional custom features. DeskMan/2 Components: DeskMan/2 Workplace Shell Manager Efficiently Manage Your Workplace Shell! * Easy to use drag & drop interface * Complete command line interface + REXX & CID support * Comprehensive online manual + context sensitive help * Provide each user with a personalized desktop, customizing access to features and choices * Manage standardized or personalized desktops on standalone or networked PCs * Selectively save and recreate objects; even transport them between desktops, computers, and versions of OS/2 * Save, restore, and transport system settings * Recreate standard objects - even those you have never saved * Complete control over object settings and styles * Delete objects (even those the shredder won't) * Recover from, or prevent, accidental changes to your desktop * Restrict access to DeskMan/2 or WPS features * Much more - total management of Workplace Shell VUEMan/2 Visual User Environment Manager Increase Your Productivity! * Makes multi-tasking easy; use and organize many concurrent activities with an easy to use, drag & drop, point & click user interface. * Switch effortlessly between as many as 81 "virtual desktops" - like having up to 81 monitors that all fit right on your desk! * Drag and drop objects from WPS to virtual desktops, and between virtual desktops. * "Layouts" record window position and size for automatic re-positioning and re-sizing at any future time. * Automatically open your favorite layout when you start VUEMan/2 * Keep your favorite windows open in every virtual desktop * Define a "hot key" and put the power of VUEMan/2 at your fingertips! * Use "Keep on top" to maintain VUEMan/2 window visibility at all times for immediate use * Protect individual windows, or groups of windows, with passwords * Change layouts and other options from the command line DeskMan/2 Extensions Workplace Shell Extensions Configure the Workplace Shell to Work Your Way! * Modify and enhance the runtime behavior of the Workplace Shell * Enjoy drag & drop without using special keys to shadow or copy * Control, selectively or globally, all Workplace Shell defined object styles, menu items and capabilities - the ability to Arrange, Sort, Delete, Rename, Settings, Lockup, Shutdown, etc. (even object visibility!), is completely definable. * Open multiple icon, details, or tree views for any folder * Reduce Desktop clutter; individual objects can selectively close, hide, or minimize their parent folder when launched. * Quickly and easily open or close a chain of folders * Restart the Workplace Shell without rebooting * Corporate edition available with password protection for objects, audit trailing for Workplace Shell activities, and other custom enhancements DM2Image Configuration Snapshot Facility Save Your Working Environment! * Save and restore an unlimited number of complete system configurations (including active or inactive WPS desktops) * Configuration snapshots are compressed for maximum efficiency * Terrific for disaster recovery; training and demo machines; and other uses. * Protects your WPS desktop, .INI files, config.sys, startup.cmd, autoexec.bat, WIN-OS/2 desktop and other system configuration data * Extensible rules let you customize configuration definitions * Optionally tracks up to 99 generations of each saved configuration * Optionally keeps a log of save activity * Command line and PM interfaces ___________________________________________ Upgrading DeskMan/2 ___________________________________________ This procedure assumes that you are upgrading from DeskMan/2, version 1.00, 1.01, 1.10, 1.11, 1.20, the 1.5 release introduced at the April 1994 IBM PSP Technical Interchange, 1.5 GA, or 1.51 to version 1.51a. It further assumes that you still have your original program diskette, plus an archive called DM151A.ZIP, which contains a copy of this file, as well as the appropriate patch files to update your current version of DeskMan/2 to the latest version of DeskMan/2. If you know which version of DeskMan/2 you are currently using, you could substitute a smaller, version specific archive, such as specified in the table below: Version Patch file archive 1.00 DM2100.ZIP - upgrades this version to version 1.51a (GA) 1.01 DM2101.ZIP - upgrades this version to version 1.51a (GA) 1.10 DM2110.ZIP - upgrades this version to version 1.51a (GA) 1.11 DM2111.ZIP - upgrades this version to version 1.51a (GA) 1.20 DM2120.ZIP - upgrades this version to version 1.51a (GA) 1.5 (PSP) DM2PSP.ZIP - upgrades this version to version 1.51a (GA) 1.5 (GA) DM215R.ZIP - upgrades this version to version 1.51a (GA) 1.51 DM151R.ZIP - upgrades this version to version 1.51a (GA) Any DM151A.ZIP - upgrades all previous versions to version 1.51a. Upgrading DeskMan/2 consists of upgrading the DeskMan/2 distribution files, and reinstalling. The new DevTech installation tool should detect and use any settings and defaults from your existing DeskMan/2 installation. The procedure will update your DeskMan/2 master files. None of your current DeskMan/2 files will be impacted until step 7. In no case will your existing DeskMan/2 data files be changed during the upgrade procedure. It may be necessary to shut down and restart the system in step 7, if DeskMan/2 has been used after the system was last booted. NOTE: If you are using OS/2 2.1 GA, please make sure that you have applied all available OS/2 patches and fixes before installing DeskMan/2. This specifically includes the fixes contained within 21WPSF.ZIP found on CompuServe, GEnie, OS2BBS, and elsewhere. Substitute the name of your Patch file archive for DM151R.ZIP in any of the following steps: 1) Create a new directory on your hard disk. For example: MD C:\DESKMAN2 2) Copy all the files from your DeskMan/2 installation diskette into this new directory. For example: COPY A:\*.* C:\DESKMAN2\*.* /V 3) Those who have version 1.5 of DeskMan/2 must unpack the packed file, DESKMAN.15@, and delete the DESKMAN.15@ and UNPACK.EXE files from the directory. For example: UNPACK DESKMAN.15@ DELETE DESKMAN.15@ DELETE UNPACK.EXE Those who have version 1.51 of DeskMan/2 must unpack the packed file, PACKAGE.EXE, and delete PACKAGE.EXE from the directory. For example: PACKAGE.EXE DELETE PACKAGE.EXE 4) Place the archive, DM151A.ZIP, into the new directory. For example: Copy DM151A.ZIP into C:\DESKMAN2 5) Unzip all files in the archive. For example: UNZIP DM151A.ZIP 6) Apply the update. For example: UPDATE 7) Your new directory now contains your updated DeskMan/2 files. First delete the archive and patch files, and then please back up the remaining files before running the installation procedure. For example: DELETE PATCH.EXE DELETE UPDATE.CMD DELETE *.RTP DELETE DM151A.ZIP MD D:\BACKUP COPY C:\DESKMAN2\*.* D:\BACKUP\*.* /V INSTALL It may be necessary to shut down and restart the system, if DeskMan/2 has been used after the system was last booted. 8) Run the INSTALL program. You will be presented with a number of options. The simplest way is to select "Do Express Actions" while the "Express Action" button is set to "Install" and the Default Target Directory points to the location where you wish the files installed. Alternatively, you can do a Custom Installation by clicking on the "Custom Installation" button. This takes you to the Custom Installation screen, where you are presented with options for each of the various components in the DeskMan/2 package, including the DeskMan/2 object, the DM/2 Image and PM Image objects, and VUEMan/2. You can install, uninstall, remove, or skip any of the various DeskMan/2 components. You can also specify individual directories for most of the files. Context sensitive help is displayed in the bottom line of the installation windows throughout the installation process. For the purpose of this overview, we will assume that you elected to install everything. Note: If you want to delete some files from the DeskMan/2 package, you must use the Remove options on the Custom Installation screen to properly do so. 9) After you have told the Install program what options should be used, you will be asked for your customer name, if you have not previously entered it. After entering your customer name, the DevTech folder will be created; and then the DeskMan/2 object, the DeskMan/2 User's Guide, the DeskMan/2 WPS Extension's User's Guide, the DM/2 Image object, the PM Image object, and the VUEMan/2 object will be installed. Double-click the small icon in the upper left corner of the installation window to end the installation process. Alternatively, you can click on the Exit button or you can select Exit from the Processing menu. Either will take you back to the initial installation screen and begin to exit the program. Note: The DM/2 Image and PM Image objects are different interfaces to the same program, the DeskMan/2 WPS Image Backup facility. The former is a non-PM UI and the latter is a PM GUI. 10) Congratulations. At this point, you have completed the installation of DeskMan/2 v1.51. You should now have a DevTech Folder on your desktop, containing between one and six new icons. The actual number depends on the components you elected to install. Two key objects represent the DeskMan/2 User's Guides. If there are any additional questions about DeskMan/2, these User's Guides should provide the answers. It is highly recommended that users read through the Introduction, DeskMan/2, DM/2 Image and VUEMan/2 sections in the DeskMan/2 User's Guide, and the "What are the DeskMan/2 WPS Extensions?" section in the DeskMan/2 WPS Extensions User's Guide. 11) After installing the new version of DeskMan/2, please check DeskMan/2's settings notebook and the System - usually found in the System Setup folder - object's settings notebook - particularly the Extensions tab - to verify that your settings are set as desired. We recommend that all REXX generation be turned off unless required, and that both icon and data-file saves be enabled. We STRONGLY recommend that you set aside one or more directories for use solely by DeskMan/2's save and restore features. Close the settings notebook(s). ---------- IMPORTANT! File references were changed between versions 1.11 and 1.20, so please follow the following steps carefully if upgrading from pre-1.20 code. [Skip this section entirely if you are upgrading from DeskMan/2 version 1.20 or later] ---------- A) Change your directory to the directory that contains your saved object description file(s). Backup this directory, and any subdirectories. You will be deleting the files stored here, and recreating them with the new version of DeskMan/2. B) Verify that you have only DeskMan/2's saved object description files (.DRC) and other internal files in your directory. To do this, you can compare the files you see on a directory listing with the files referenced by the pathnames in the DeskMan/2 notebook settings. If you see only DESKMAN.DRC, or any of the following: DESKMAN.IRC, DESKMAN.CMD, DESKMANI.CMD, or DESKMAN.LOG files; along with a bunch of files that look like the names of objects which you see in your Templates folder, you're fine. Go to step C. If you do not see this, open your DRIVES folder, open the drives object that contains the directory where you have your saved object description files, and examine that directory through the graphical interface. If you see the files mentioned above, then continue with step C, otherwise skip to step D. C) To make sure that you start out with a clean system, we're going to delete your .DRC, .CMD, and data-file files from this directory. Be careful not to delete any other files, if you are using this directory for any other purpose than storing DeskMan/2's various storage files. If you are storing your icons in this directory, go ahead and delete them if you wish. If you are storing your icons in a subdirectory, go ahead and delete them from that subdirectory too, if you want to remove the saved icon files. Note that this has no effect upon your existing objects' icons, only upon saved icons and icons not in use that are saved in the same directory. D) Save your desktop, using the DM/2 Image or PM Image programs, creating an image of the WPS configuration immediately after installing the new version of DeskMan/2. For example: FLUSH DM2IMAGE SAVE NEW E) Save your desktop, again, using DeskMan/2 to automatically recreate your saved object files and placing copies of your icons and data-file objects into the appropriate sub-directories. For example: Click MB2 on the DeskMan/2 object Select the Save desktop option F) Congratulations, you have now saved your system configuration using your new copy of DeskMan/2 version 1.51, and have both a system image, and an object-by-object backup of your Workplace Shell desktop. ___________________________________________ Changes in this version ___________________________________________ NOTE: This version has been enhanced to provide additional functionality, ease of use, and robustness under the new OS/2 Warp system from IBM. Some of the improvements made include: * New 'animated' icon for the DevTech folder. (Not changed since 1.51) * Supports saving and restoring 'animated' icons. (Not changed since 1.51) * Improved support for saving and restoring the LaunchPad. * New setup strings defined and/or supported by the DeskMan/2 WPS Extensions and the DeskMan/2 object under Warp - see the DeskMan/2 WPS Extensions User's Guide for details. * Handles missing WIN-OS/2 or Windows desktops when saving system settings, even if the option to save this information is checked. * Improved icon resource handling during Restore. * Allows "Cancel Processing" more easily during Restore. * Allows mouse button mappings for Drag & Drop operations. * Shortened DeskMan/2 object initialization sequence. Shorter initialization times inprove overall Workplace Shell reliability. * Support for multi-line object titles on LaunchPad. * Will not assign object IDs to WPRPrinters during Save operations. * Revised CLEANUP.CMD to find all used icon files, including secondary ones used for animated folders. * No longer opens certain Internet Access Kit folders, avoiding automatic sign-on requests. * Doesn't populate Visualizer folders (IBMSQLDatabase), preventing automatic Database and Network sign-ons. As a result, the contents of these special folders will not be saved automatically while saving the Desktop. The user can save the contents by opening the folder and using manual Drag & Drop to save the individual objects. * A "Select description file" open dialog was added to the Open -> DeskMan/2 file menu item. Double-clicking will still open the default DRC file. * Additional OS2.INI applications included when system settings saved: PM_SystemBackground, PM_SystemFonts, PM_Workplace, PM_WorkPlace:Options, PM_SysPointer, PM_Workplace:FolderAutoClose. * Removed REXX support for LaunchPad contents. * Fixed DRIVENUM setup string for REXX generation. * Fixed VUEMan/2 launch on drop for objects with multi-line titles. * Fixed Prompt on Save with Replace option. * Fixed a minor problem with one-time-only password protection of windows. * Fixed a problem with starting VUEMan/2 out of STARTUP.CMD, or at other times when the DeskMan/2 object is installed but temporarily unavailable. * Fixed problem with DM/2 Image involving WIN-OS/2 or Windows desktop backup. =========================================================================== We thank all those whose efforts and suggestions helped us to create this latest version of DeskMan/2. The DeskMan/2 Development Team Development Technologies, Inc.