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Loading a Win 95 Shell

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by alan.robinson 2 views

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I need to load just a Win 95 shell, I have an Application that must run under Win 95 but it does not need the GUI, nor do I need the GU for any other Apps', How do I set this up from a clean install.

Thanks
Alan R

17 replies

by Member 26407291

howdy alan,

a few qs ...
1- do you mean you want just the w95 dos?
2- do you need network support also?
3- does it hafta be win95? not dos 6.22?

-lee

by volovoy

Edit Msdos.sys file by using Notepad.exe. Change BootGUI=1 to BootGUI=0, save this file and reload Win 95. You'll have Windows 95 shell wothout GUI.

Good luck
Alex

by tjc

If it's a windows program then you will need the OS, you may not need any other programs, like wordpad, notepad, etc. but the mear fact that the windows shell needs the rest of the OS that you don't see, like control panel, means that you can't justboot up to dos and run explorer.exe since that is the shell of the GUI you will still need the rest of the OS parts, the kernel and it's related disk i/o files and such. Sorry but what you want can't be done.

by alan.robinson

The machine I have "was" configured like this and it worked that way before the drive was wiped clean, Perhaps I am not describing it correctly, I just need to run Win95 OS and this one App, I want the GUI/Desktop invisible to the user and I want this one App to open at startup. As far as peripheral support required I just need standard stuff, COM ports, LPT port and ISA Bus, I do NOT need PNP support.

Thanks

by mark.dove

If you are running NT based OS, try running command.exe to open a prompt instead of cmd.exe - this might give the required background params for your win95 app.

by tjc

What Program exactly? Since you can have a minimal install of Win95 on the comtpuer and then isntall your APP that you have and place it in the startup folder. The other problem is on the exit, shutting down the comtpuer from inside of that App. Does it have a Shutdown inside of it?

by alan.robinson

It is one of our "Proprietary Applications" (This is for a Business)
As far as a "Shutdown" there in NO shutdown prompt within the App, The machine is just normally shutdown (Which I know is a no no with 95) but what I am talking about was done somehow with this configuration, I am trying to kind of reverse Engineer this process. I am thinking that just like you can make a Win95 boot disk (Floppy) that that was done to the HD, just copy over the Command.com and Sys.com and maybe a few otherfiles and that will give me a bootable disk to run the App from, I don't know for sure but I am going to try that.

Thanks

by volovoy

The file Msdos.sys is located in the root directory of C: drive after installation Windows 95 at any computer. File has attributes System and Hidden, so change this this before editing. Use Windows Explorer or Find option in Start menu to locate this file.

Alex

by tjc

One final try for me on this. Are you sure your are not running a DOS program, that the people had installed on a Windows 95 comtpuer that was setup to boot in dos mode (see the other posts for that)? if that is the case then format the c: drive as selfbooting with a win 95 startup disk and then install your dos program.

by geosean

This one should be quite easy.
Start the PC, and boot to the command prompt (Hit ??? at the Starting Windows prompt).
In the /Windows folder, open System.ini (use EDIT or any other text editor).
In the [Boot] section, look for the line:

shell=Explorer.exe

change it to:

;shell=Explorer.exe

and then insert a new line:

shell=:\\.exe

Save and Exit. Restart.

Enjoy!

by alan.robinson

THIS WAS THE "CLOSEST SOLUTION" TO MY PROBLEM ALTHOUGH IT WAS A LITTLE MORE COMPLICATED THAN THAT.

THANKS

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