cmd prompt / ms-dos problem: shift problem

Basically, I use an old ms-dos program, Turbo C++ 3.0, to program in Windows XP. However, recently after a few months of not using the program, I started using it again. For some reason whenever I move the cursor around with the arrow keys, it'll automatically highlight as though I was holding down the shift key. Whether or not I hold down the shift key has no effect on this. Also, whenever I press insert or delete, it'll automatically cut and paste (respectively) as though I was holding down the shift key. When I turn off numlock, the program stops highlighting when I move the cursor, but then I cannot highlight at all. I know neither of my shift keys are not stuck, because it doesn't type every letter in capitals.

I don't have this problem in normal windows programs, only in dos programs. I've found ms-dos editor to suffer from the same problem.

The only reasonable explanation I can think of is that one of the recent windows update patches / fixes I installed caused the problem, but I tried uninstalling all of them and that did not solve the problem. I'm stumped and cannot think of anything that is causing this problem (and yes, I've tried rebooting, turning the computer off completely and back on, and a different keyboard). Anyone else have any idea what my problem is?

 

Shot in the dark- do you use Powertoys Tweak UI? I made the mistake once of changing the way windows hold their focus with it and nearly drove myself crazy trying to use an elderly accounting program I use for my church.

You can also try the backwards compatibility feature XP has built in. Maybe that would make it work like it was designed to. HTH
Johanna

 

Since I'm not sure what Powertoys Tweak UI is, I'll assume I'm not using it. As for the backwards compatibility option, I tried it with no luck.

 

Jeff - not sure how you are starting the "DOS" window and you may already be aware of this but with XP
cmd.exe and command.com give you totally different apps.

Cmd.exe starts a 32bit command window. Command.com starts an older, limited, quirky 16bit window used if there are compatibility issues with running an app from the 32bit window.

 

Hmm, I didn't actually know that, but I tried running it in both and it didn't make a difference

 

My best guess at this point is that one of the updates made a change to the environment values and that rolling back the update didn't "undo" whatever that change was.

I'm not sure how to fix your problem but if it's worth the effort, you should be able to set up a VDM (virtual DOS machine) with associated config.sys and autoexec.bat files to have things just the way your older app wants them and run it fine that way. You'd basically be creating a 640Kb DOS system that would run in a portion of the XP's memory and never know XP was there.

 

Hmm, I'm not quite sure how I would do that, but this program is important enough to me that the problem is frustrating me a lot. I was wondering if it's possible to reinstall dos alone or something.

 

Are you running any third-party programs in the systray like the ATI taskbar, etc. ?

 

Are you running any third-party programs in the systray like the ATI taskbar, etc. ?

Good thought.

If that doesn't pan out, I imagine your C++ has a section of the manual that specifies the config.sys & autoexec.bat items it needs. Others would just be generic.

Troubleshooting MS-DOS-Based Programs in Windows is XP specific and offers good suggestions.

 

Are you running any third-party programs in the systray like the ATI taskbar, etc. ?

Oh my gosh! I terminated my ATI Taskbar thingy and my problem dissappeared! That was probably one of the last things I thought of that could be a cause of my problem! For one thing I didn't even think about it causing a problem since I always had it running before when I used Turbo without a problem. However, I recently updated my drivers.

I don't know much about the ATI Taskbar. Will all my graphics intensive programs work without it running or is there a way to make it so that it doesn't interefere with my dos programs?

Thank you so much Angel71!!! (Especially for giving me a specific example)

 

Jeff - the ATI Taskbar is essentially a shortcut to the video settings. You can get there other ways so stopping it should cause zero problems.

 

Ok, thanks a lot.