

                                                   Process Commander 1.0 Fix 1
                                                              February 1, 1997
                                               (C)95-97 Stardock Systems, Inc.



  1. INTRODUCTION

  Information about the current level 1.01 is appended at the end of
  this file.

  Welcome to the first FixKit for Process Commander 1.0! We are proud to
  present a number of changes to Process Commander which will make our
  product even more reliable. See the file CHANGES.TXT for the most
  important changes. Notice that we both addressed problems and bugs but
  also did some quality improvement. More FixKits are planned for the
  future and you can expect more qualitative improvement.

  Thanks to all users who helped us to locate problems with Process Commander!


  2. INSTALLATION

  The FixKit consists of only one executable named FIX01.EXE. Just start this
  program and everything will start automatically.

  Naturally, Process Commander 1.0 should be installed on your hard disk
  before you apply this fix.


  3. SUPPORT

  If you experience problems with this FixKit, please contact Stardock
  support:

       WWW:          Stardock Homepage: http://www.stardock.com
                     PC Homepage:       http://www.stardock.com/pc.html
                     PC Howto:          http://www.stardock.com/pchowto/

       CompuServe:   On CompuServe type GO STARDOCK.

       IBMLINK:      On the IBM IBMLINK service, there is a STARDOCK CFORUM.

       Stardock BBS: The Stardock BBS (313)/453-1845 in the Process Commander
                     file and message area.

       email:        support@stardock.com

       More updates to Process Commander will be available on the
       BBS and the World Wide Web site.

       If you need to speak with a technical support representative,
       call (313) 453-0328 Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.,
       Eastern Standard Time.

       Sales:

       Site license pricing for Process Commander is available.

       Please contact us at (313) 453-0328 or sales@stardock.com
       for more information about our site license programs for
       Process Commander.



  Copyrights and Trademarks:

        OS/2 is a trademark of International Business Machines
        Corporation

        Process Commander is a trademark of Stardock Systems, Inc.
        (c) 1996 Stardock Systems (SDS) Inc.

==========================================================================

 Information about FixKit 1
 --------------------------

   PC Fullscreen:

     The PC Fullscreen introduces a new kill method and a few new menu points.
     The new kill method is called "Assistant kill" and can be found in the
     "Actions" menu, as a button in the details view. It is also the Standard
     kill method in the Assistant window. It uses a combination of all
     provided methods and tries to find out the optimal way to remove a
     process. If you are not sure how to kill a process, use this method.
     However, if you know that a process can be terminated easily you can
     it is quicker to use 'k' for STandard termination (kill).

     One of the new menu points (part of Actions/process manipulation) is
     called "minimize priority". In some cases a program can need so much
     CPU time, that the Presentation Manager slows down dramatically. Using
     this menu item you'll lower the priority of this process. Other processes
     will run better and faster then.

     The other two menu items are called "Hide" and "Show". Do not use them
     on systems without "asynchronous focus change" (FixPak 17, Warp 4).
     However it is possible to hide a process. This is especially useful
     when a process was unable to terminate and leaves a "black hole" on the
     screen. You can try to hide the "black hole" with the "Hide" button.
     Even though this method works in many cases we recommend to reboot
     as soon as possible (after saving all data, of course). Do not try to
     switch to the faulty process via the window list.

     A new parameter /NOPM was added. When this parameter is used the
     PMWIN.DLL is not loaded at all. It is possible that PC is able to
     be activated in more situations then, but several features (like
     the ability to retrieve the window title, hide & show, and parts
     of the Assistant) are not available.

     Some video cards may show garbage when activated in critical situations.
     Try the paramater /PREVIO in those situations. PC starts additional
     initializing after the PM is loaded. You may also try to use
     /NOFADE which omits the fade-in effect of PC. (Users of quick PC
     can also use /FADE:x, where x=delay in ms to speed up this effect).

   Enhanced Shutdown:

     The Enhanced Shutdown was reworked to be compatible with more systems.
     On some systems a SYS3170 was raised in special situations. This should
     be fixed in the current FixKit. We also recommend to install FixPak 1
     of OS/2 Warp 4, because it addresses a similar problem.

     We improved the timing of the Enhanced Shutdown. The log files will
     now also show time stamps. When you shut down your system with Process
     Commander, you'll get several messages in the lower left corner.

     The message "Initiating OS/2 Standard Shutdown" should not be visible
     before all Windows disappeared. If you can see this message during
     the process cleanup, the shutdown is probably too fast on your
     system. Use the environment variable PC_SHUTDOWN_DELAY to control the
     speed. This variable is interpreted as a floating point number.
     For example the line
        set PC_SHUTDOWN_DELAY=1.25
     will make both types of shut down about 25% slower. In cases you have
     problems with the shut down, use a number greater than 1.0. (Start
     with 3.0). However, when you have a fast computer with much RAM and
     few running processes you can also speed up the shutdown by specifying
     a value lower than 1.0.

     If you don't want to get status messages about shutdown, disable the
     logging in the Master Setup or specify
        set PC_SHUTDOWN_NOWINDOW=YES
     in your config.sys.

     The Quick Shutdown will post WM_QUIT to all PM programs by setting
        set PC_SHUTDOWN_WMQUIT=YES
     in the config.sys. WM_QUIT is softer than killing a process, but we
     do not recommend to use this setting. Especially when using a virtual
     desktop, a program may save a window position that is outside the
     visible area of the desktop.

     Unfortunately the shutdown program (shutdown.exe) was not working
     correctly in PC 1.0. To display the shutdown message box of Process
     Commander run shutdown.exe from the Process Commander directory.

     If you are a system administrator and must turn off the systems
     at e.g. 11 p.m. every day, initiate the following command on 10.45 p.m.:
        shutdown -minwait:300 -msgbox:alert -quick:yes
     This shows a message box that informs the user about the shutdown.
     After 5 minutes (300 seconds) a Quick Shutdown is started. It will
     probably take up to 5 minutes, but this depends on the system. The
     Quick Shutdown will try to flush all buffers even if the Standard
     OS/2 Shutdown is not working correctly (e.g. a because of a hung PM).
     You avoid chkdsk this way when the power is turned off at 11 p.m..
     Of course you should test this precedure several times to adjust
     the timing.

     If you ever have problems with the shutdown, save the file shutdown.log
     (normally located in \OS2\BOOT on your boot drive). Please send us
     this file, explaining what happend and what part of shut down did not
     work. Please note that OS/2 is inable to shut down correctly when an
     application is hanging. The Process Commander Shutdown will try to save
     all buffers then.

