FAQS! FACTS! FAX! 143 (07/01/99)

MORE DIRECTORY ENQUIRIES

I read your article in about printing Windows Explorer directories (F!F!F! December 17th) with interest. I had often wondered how to do this and I found your suggestions worked fine, although the printouts were in a fairly basic style.

There is another way and I think you will find it has a more 'professional' look. Create a hypertext document in Notepad with the line:

<a href="file:///c:/directory/">Directory</a>

where C:/directory is the directory you wish to print. Give the Notepad document a name such as foldprnt.htm or folderprint.html (Windows 95/98). Save this file in any directory you wish. Open this hypertext document with your browser program (I use Netscape). Click on the hypertext link (Directory) and use your browser's print button to get your finished document.  You will notice that all the screen information will appear in the finished printout together with a clear heading. All the file names are also hypertext links so you can open any file directly from this list. Incidentally you can save the resulting directory list as yet another hypertext document.

David Owen

1. Go to Start, Program, MSDOS Prompt.

This takes you to a DOS screen with the C:\Windows prompt.

2. Type A:

This takes you to the floppy.

3. Type DIR  > PRN

Alternatively DIR  > LPT1     

Note spaces around '>' are important.

This will print the root directory, which is the default.

4. To select a directory from a tree, type DIR when the floppy is available, this will show the root directory on the screen, select the directory from the screen using the CD command and then print as above in 3.

Basil H. Grose

With the subject floppy in the 'A' drive, from Windows 95 Start menu go to Programs and click on MS-DOS Prompt

at C:\Windows>  type 'A:'

at A:\>  type 'DIR'

at A:\>  type 'DIR>INDEX'

at A:\>  type 'EXIT'

open any word processor, open file 'INDEX' on the 'A' drive and edit to suit.

Oh for the joys of MSDOS!

Roger Hardy-Birt

Use the redirect command (>) from a DOS shell to create a file which can then be printed by any text editor (Notepad, etc). Typing a command as 'dir a:\ > list.txt' in a DOS window will create a text file exactly duplicating the screen display. Rod Goslin

Here's a small refinement of the F!F!F! batch file to print out the directory

of a floppy disk. Open Notepad, and type in:

'DIR A: %1>LPT1'

to print just the root directory, or:

'DIR A:/s %1>LPT'

to print the contents of root and subdirectories. If you type:

'DIR A:/s/o:n /o:g %1>LPT1'

this will print all files in the root & subdirectories, in alphabetical order, with the directories listed above the files. As before, Save As foldprnt.bat in the root of C: drive. Then, in Windows Explorer, right-click on foldprnt, choose "Create Shortcut", and drag the shortcut to the Desktop. Right-click on the shortcut and choose Properties, then the Program tab. Under Run, select Minimised, and tick the Close On Exit box, then click OK. To run it, just click the icon on the desktop, it will print the directories and close itself afterwards.

Robin Somes

A quicker way is to use a utility called Snagit from Techsmith details at: http://www.techsmith.com/

products/snagit/index.htm

This enables capture of the entire contents of a directory in one go as an image or as a text file.

John Dean

There is a freeware program available from: 

http://freeusers.digibel.be/~wimh

which does exactly what you want in a very simple and effective way.

Bob Copley

Try a shareware program called ExpPrint, from JD Design: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/jdd/

Ged McKnight

XtreeGold in 'Directory Command' mode press 'P' to print a catalogue of tagged files (you can tag all files with 2 keystrokes or select your choice) with statistics for each file. There is also the option of printing the drive 'Pathnames' and the 'Tree'.

Brian Hayter

Obviously DOS still has its uses, and a great many admirers. We had a truly amazing response to this apparently simple query so thanks to everyone who took the trouble to write in.

EASY ACCENTS

I was very pleased to discover how to insert an umlaut (F!F!F! December 17th). Is there a similar method of inserting grave, circumflex and acute accents as well as cedillas?

Pam Weston

A

If you are using a word processor like MS Word or Lotus Word Pro you will find details of all available accented characters in Help, under Special Characters. In Word, for example, you just select Symbol from the Insert menu and either double click on the character to insert it into a document, or assign it a keyboard shortcut, if it is going to be used frequently. You can also use an ANSI (American National Standards Institute) code to generate accented characters, by pressing and holding the 'ALT' key and using the keypad (with Num lock enabled) to enter the relevant code. You can find this by going to Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Character Map. There you will find a full set of characters for each font. Highlight the character or symbol and it's ANSI code or keyboard assignment will appear in the bottom right hand corner of the window.

VULGAR TYPE

I have Windows 98 with MS Word. How do I write vulgar fractions, such as 3/16, etc. or any other figure, but written with a horizontal dividing line, with the enumerator above and the dividend below? According to Help I should key in Ctrl \F, but that gets Find.

T. Rowntree, Soberton, Hants

A

Help isn't very helpful in this case, what it is describing is an equation field code, but it doesn't go into enough detail. There is an easy way however, and that is to go to the Insert drop-down menu and select Field, in the Categories Window click on Equations and Formulas and in the Field Names window highlight EQ. In the Field Code window the letters EQ appear, insert a cursor after the letters and type: '\f(a,b)' (leaving out the inverted commas) where the letters 'a' and 'b' represent the enumerator and dividend respectively, and don't forget the comma. Click OK and the fraction will be inserted into the document. You can reduce the size using the typeface commands on the Formatting toolbar.

WORD PICTURE

Please help a comparative newcomer to PCs. I have used Microsoft Word to set up and print a personal letterhead and have also printed photographs via my Plustek Optic Pro scanner. However, I can find no instructions on how to transfer a photo, reduced, onto the letterhead. Can you please guide me?

Peter Pascoe

A

It's easy, first decide where you want the picture to go by clicking a flashing cursor into the open document. Next, from the Insert menu in Word select Picture and click on the From File option and use the directory tree that appears to locate the image. When you have found it click on the listing once and a preview of the picture will appear in the right-hand window, if it's the one you want click okay, Word will change to the Page Layout view and the picture will be imported into your open Word document. Click onto the image to insert sizing squares, so you can move it around and alter its shape and dimensions.