From Newsgroup: comp.os.cpm

Hi,

Two questions :

Is it possible to run something from one user number in another? As far as
I'm aware the answer is 'no'[1]. i.e. in 1B: run 1A:SUBMIT

Has anyone created a drive letter mapping that returns the same contents regardless of user number?

I'm busy creating myself a development environment for an Amstrad PC/W
(and possibly also a Kaypro 10 I have at some point) using the rather excellent CP/M Box from Habisoft.

This has two really useful features :

1) Built in UIDE hard disk support, so I don't need to eternally swap
virtual floppies.

2) An M: drive (which would normally be a RAM drive on a real Amstrad
PCW), which can optionally map directly to a local filesystem directory
but where *it always does this regardless of user number* !

2) in particular removes a huge amount of pain that would be present doing
the same in real hardware. It would be great to have this under actual hardware too.

[1] Yes, I'm aware of the G switch in PIP. Surprisingly this isn't
included in the official PCW manuals, which are otherwise pretty decent.
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From Newsgroup: comp.os.cpm

On Sun, 6 Jul 2025 01:33:38 -0000 (UTC), Peter Kay wrote:

Is it possible to run something from one user number in another? As far
as I'm aware the answer is 'no'[1]. i.e. in 1B: run 1A:SUBMIT

You can use a shell extension such as XCCP or EPEX to achieve this. It's
a small piece of software that you load which then adds a number of useful extensions to the normal CP/M CCP.

https://techtinkering.com/articles/xccp-a-shell-extension-for-cpm/ https://techtinkering.com/articles/epex-an-environment-extension-for-cpm/

Although, both of these require CP/M 2.2 so no good for the PCW but maybe useful for the Kaypro.

Has anyone created a drive letter mapping that returns the same contents regardless of user number?

I can't think of anything that does this, but there are a number of
utilities that ease using user areas.

You can use SD can to list files across all user numbers for a drive using
the $A argument. For example, to list all the .ASM files, including this
that might be compressed, in all user areas, you could use:
A> SD *.A?M $A

To do the above across all drives as well you could use:
A> SD *.A?M $AD


You can also use XCCP, which will provide automatic searching of A0: if
you try to run a command and it isn't found in the current drive and user number.

EPEX takes this one step further by adding search paths and CP/M 3 comes
with this built-in.


Have fun


Lorry

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