Building and Running a DOS Program

The Development Environment produces DOS programs that run under the DOS or Windows operating environments.

DOS programs are appropriate when:

You want to learn programming fundamentals.

You already have the character-based source code for the program.

The program doesn't need the Windows interface to execute. A utility is an example of this type of program.

To familiarize yourself with the steps for creating a DOS program, use either the FIRST project from Chapter 3 or a project of your own.

·To create a DOS program:

1.From the Project menu, choose Open. The Open Project dialog box appears.

2.Enter a project name with a .MAK file extension and choose OK. The Edit Project dialog box appears.

3.Select a file to add to the project and choose Add, or double-click the filename. Repeat until all files are added to the project.

4.Choose OK. The project is set as the current project.

5.From the Options menu, choose Project. The Project dialog box appears.

6.Select the DOS EXE Program Type button (see Figure 4.1). You can also select compiler and linker options with Customize Build Flags, but for this example, use the default settings. See Part 2 for information about compiler and linker options.

7.From the Build Mode options, select Release.

8.Choose OK.

9.From the Project menu, choose Build. The project is automatically saved.

If no errors are reported, you can run the program. To do so, choose Go from the Run menu.

NOTE:

If you are creating a DOS program with only one source file, you can optionally elect not to create a project. If no project is specified, the Graphical Development Environment attempts to build the active source window using the current compiler and linker settings.