| | 1 | This project was launched by Alexey Smirnov in 1997 after the long investigation of OS/2 system utilities market. For now this is a NETLABS.ORG project and its runs under BSD (programs) and LGPL (runtime) licenses. |
| | 2 | |
| | 3 | So, if you start to compare the common set of Win32 system utilities with all that were made for OS/2, you may see the great precipice that divide these two markets. More over, a lot of OS/2 developers were switched to porting UNIX applications instead of creating native code lately. The author thinks that this process may lead to total superseding of OS/2 native apps with their porting analogs, including UNIX-ported apps and apps that will be ported with the help of [http://trac.netlabs.org/odin32 Odin] project. |
| | 4 | |
| | 5 | So, SysInfo/2 developer try to perform a hard work - write a complete set of OS/2 PM system utilities that will be complete enough to compare with well-known Symantec Norton Utilities for Windows 95/NT. This set will include not only System Information tool, but also SpeedDisk, DiskDoctor, etc. But this is a future. |
| | 6 | |
| | 7 | ==System Info as it is:== |
| | 8 | Well, lets start from the beginning. After doing a SystemInfo utility, you may think that you can understand a use ~75% of OS/2 system API. Also you will got a lot of experience in using your compiler, so all next projects will be finished a little bit faster. |
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| | 10 | System Information Tool is written using SpeedSoft Sibyl compiler. Sibyl is an integrated visual environment (IDE) and is looks like a Delphi analog for OS/2. But for now Sibyl is a dead project, SpeedSoft Web site is down and no new version will be made. We have a compete set of development environment to keep on working with SysInfo/2 project, but in the nearest future we plan to switch to open-source Pascal IDE and compiler ([http://sibyl.netlabs.org/ OpenSibyl project]). |
| | 11 | |
| | 12 | SysInfo/2 was created using well-known Norton SysInfo as an example. Some pictures that are used in SysInfo/2 were taken from it and also from other Win32 apps, but now it comes with new pictures thanks to Joachim Benjamins. |
| | 13 | |
| | 14 | So, using SysInfo/2 you may get a complete set of hardware and software information. Also you can detect all your PCI cards, even if they are not detected and not in use by OS/2 system. |
| | 15 | |
| | 16 | ==External API used by program:== |
| | 17 | |
| | 18 | '''For SysInfo/2 ver. 0.7.6 and higher:''' |
| | 19 | SysInfo/2 is using [ftp://ps.software.ibm.com/ps/products/os2/fixes/v4.5warp/theseus4/ IBM Theseus 4] software to get information about memory distribution, running processes and so on. For PRE Aurora OS/2 system, [ftp://ps.software.ibm.com/ps/products/os2/fixes/v4warp/theseus3/ IBM Theseus 3] modules are used. SysInfo/2 will try to load appropriate Theseus module depending on OS/2 core version, but if you are using OS/2 Warp 3 or Warp 4 - you should first install Theseus *.SYS driver into your CONFIG.SYS. You can find all appropriate instructions in the (English) READ.ME file coming with SysInfo/2 package. We plan to add a driver installation into SysInfo/2 package installer in the future. |
| | 20 | |
| | 21 | '''Attention!''' If you have some old copies of Theseus DLLs somewhere in your LIBPATH - SysInfo/2 will not start! Be sure that Theseus0.dll is the latest version and that there is only one copy available. |
| | 22 | |
| | 23 | '''Since SysInfo/2 0.8.9:''' |
| | 24 | All benchmarks are placed into *.DLL modules. All useful and common functions were also placed into SIRNTIME.DLL. So, you you must place them into SysInfo/2 working directory. Do not copy them to X:\OS2\DLL or somewhere in your LIBPATH. You can collect some old copies there and SysInfo/2 may crash due to it. |
| | 25 | |
| | 26 | ==Known limitations:== |
| | 27 | |
| | 28 | Our CPU identification code doesn't work with older Cyrix CPU (prior 6x86MX) due to a strange CPU reaction to CPUID command. A pre-6x86MX CPU claims it can execute this command, but it is turned off by the BIOS. |
| | 29 | |
| | 30 | As for SysInfo/2 main window size - it is designed using Sibyl base class "tabbed notebook" that is unable to resize at runtime, so for now I don't know how to resize this window to adopt it to current screen resolution. So, it is better to use SysInfo/2 with screen resolution of 800x600 and higher. |
| | 31 | |
| | 32 | Some users report that SysInfo/2 may crash on systems with Media Vision PAS-16 (ISA) sound card installed. Also this crash will occur if you use Media Vision PAS-16 (ISA) with driver taken from OS/2 Warp 3.0 distribution. We thinks that this is not a SysInfo/2 problem, but a driver bug. |
| | 33 | |
| | 34 | PCI BIOS scanning algorithm may not work with older PCI BIOSes (that can support only PCI 2.0 specification). Sorry for that. |
| | 35 | |
| | 36 | |
| | 37 | ==Project status:== |
| | 38 | Now my project is ready up to 98%. You can download SysInfo/2 here: [http://trac.netlabs.org/sysinfo Download]. |
| | 39 | |
| | 40 | For now we planned to add some text reporting features, help system and command-line switches.. A SysInfo/2 roadmap can be seen here: (RoadMap). You can add your wishes to this roadmap by mailing to [betatester@rambler.ru betatester@rambler.ru]. Also, we invite all the people who want to work with us to develop, localize and distribute SysInfo/2 over OS/2 community. |
