I've been storing my layouts on floppies for the last 10 or so years. I want to store them on the hard drive now but am puzzled.

I have about 20 floppies with jobs according to product or industrial company. I saved each floppy to a separate folder on the HD with same name.

Now, I have been told I will have to go into eguser.dat and change and save with each folder I will be engraving at the moment. For instance if I went from c:\engrave\layouts\nametags\ to c:\engrave\layouts\plaques\ I would have to edit each time.

I could put all layouts (over 1,000) into layouts without folder designation but what a mess that would be with 8 character naming.

Have I made it clear what I want to do to speed things up?

I'm hoping Laserman and others could shed some light on this for me.

It's possible I won't be on the forum for the next 3-4 days so if I dont answer any questions right away I am NOT ignoring anyone.

Thanks,

Not sure, because I don't work with what you're refering to, but if you really have to stick with one directory, you can make a spreadsheet for a cross referance. But then for each layout, you'd have to consult your sheet and look up what file you need.

Different descriptive file names and directories would be best, but since you're unable to do that the spreadsheet might work. Then you could even search for keywords.

Shaddy

Is that running DOS based or Windows based?

Sounds like an old DOS based machine. Even those usually had the ability to change directories on a load of a file. If you can select another directory when loading, use the root directory of the layouts as the selected directory so you can then go to the others easily. If it is a really old program that will load only from a preset directory only, you do have that problem in spades.

Philadelphia, PA (Really Bensalem)

When you finally understand it completely... it changes.

Shaddy and Harvey,

this is a dos based engraving program (1991). It was either a new engraver or a laser >.< 

Hi Brian
You MUST KEEP the 8 letter designations to all of the path files. It is very easy by just making you hard disk format have the same manes as the files you are using on the disks. They must be the same and never more than 8 letters. I have a machine that uses an old DOS naming structure and is running on windows, I just make sure that the path names have no more than 8 letters.
Where have all of you guys been? You are all spoiled being able to make your file names as long as you want.

Hi Brian
I am not sure how your system works but how do you get them off of the disks that you use now? Your system has a file that says put in disk ## and you select from there? If that is the way the system file that looks for the disk has a path statement that goes to A: and then you put in your disk and it searches for the file I imagine. All you need to do is copy the floppy to your hard drive in a folder of the same name as the floppy. Then you have to edit your system file to call the file from C: instead. I will try to give you an example:

Assuming that your floppies have names or numbers, copy floppy #1
called plaques(with files or directories under it) to
c:/(engraver directory name)/plaques

Your system file says to find a file located at
(engraver directory name)/A:/plaques/fred2

change that file to say:
c:/(engraver directory name)/plaques

There could also be a setup file that requires you top add this directory into your system like mine does and then I have access from in the program with a button on the screen. I have 20 or 30 directories with as many as 90 files in each one for just logos.

I hope this helps, sounds confusing but it is really easy once you get used to it. Just remember to keep the names the same other than the location of the drive. VERY IMPORTANT! Also BACKUP YOUR DATA always.

Brian,

I know what you are asking for and it can be done but it is a little bit of a challenge.

What we used to do was to use the APPEND command in dos.

You need to create a batch file to start your D1.4 within this batch file you need to Insert a line that would look something like this.

Append c:/d14/layouts/;sign;badge;etc.

your first line has to match the main layout directory of the eguser.dat file.

you should then create separate directories for the other categories.

make your categories or directories on the root drive (C:) In fact it would be easier to make all of directories on the root and then change the eguser.dat file to match.

EXAMPLE:

make a directory called Layouts (MD Layouts) on the root dir (C:)

Change the path in the eguser.dat file to C:\layouts\

Create your other directories also in the root (C:) (MD Signs)

Then add the line to a batch file to append all of the directories you create.

Append c:\layouts\;signs;badges;joesbar;etc.

when you start the d14 batch file it will connect all of the directories specified in the above command and it should allow you to call up any layout within any of the specified directories.

Experiment with a couple of directories to see if it is functioning properly then do the whole thing.

Make a back-up of the eguser.dat file in case of any problems you can revert back to the original.

Would you be able to put a copy of the .dat file in each directory, with the correct path to that dir. Then a batch file (can be the same one copied to each dir) that takes that .dat file and copies it to the root, then starts the program?

If it was in c:\d14\layouts\ you'd use (I think, you'll have to verify)
copy /y eguser.dat c:\

then the next line would initaite the program. (the "/y" means to not prompt to overwrite file)
But that's only if Laserman's suggestion doesn't work, as that sounds like a better plan.

Shaddy