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How to get games which install with XCOPY to work - GUIDE

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First post, by LoneLines

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Hi there,

If you're reading this you probably have a problem installing a nice old DOS game.
You're also probably using DOSBOX
And most likely your installation is incomplete, or just plain doesn't work...

Being the natural detective you are, you promptly realize the installer is named something like INSTALL.BAT, and since you remember that a BATch file is basically a script containing text, you open it up (with notepad or your preferred program) and discover to your horror many commands that have the following word in common: XCOPY

Currently, as far as I know, DOSBOX 0.7 does NOT support the XCOPY command (I am also not aware of builds which fix this, but naturally I could be wrong and will edit this post if someone shows me otherwise).

So, you ask yourself, how do I install games that use XCOPY without the hassle of manually copying directories?

Follow these simple steps:
* Grab this file: http://www.xxcopy.com/download/xxcopy.zip
* Extract to a folder of your choice
*Now, assuming you are mounting a C: drive in dosbox like so:
mount c c:\dosbox
(meaning, in your REAL computer, you have a dosbox folder in your c: drive, and in your DOSBOX console that folder is the ROOT)
* Create a folder called XCOPY (In your real computer: C:\DOSBOX\XCOPY and if viewed through DOSBOX console: C:\XCOPY)

* Copy the file XXCOPY16.EXE to the XCOPY folder and RENAME it to XCOPY.EXE
(if you run dosbox and type CD XCOPY and then DIR, you should now see this file).
* In dosbox.conf under the [autoexec] section add this line:
PATH %PATH%;C:\XCOPY
* Save dosbox.conf and run DOSBOX

If all is well, 99% of your XCOPY games will now work!

Please post comments/suggestions if you think I missed something.

Have fun

LoneLines list of workarounds for various games in DOSBox:
http://ADogsBox.jellofishi.com

Reply 1 of 27, by Dominus

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hmm, I wonder which dosgames need xcopy...
To me it sounds more like installation issues of pirated games that have homemade installation batch files that need xcopy.

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Reply 2 of 27, by LoneLines

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Not really, though none pop to mind at the moment, I have seen my share of original titles using xcopy (Bud Tucker perhaps?). Eventually I got sick of it and made this workaround.

I'm talking mostly about CD titles.

LoneLines list of workarounds for various games in DOSBox:
http://ADogsBox.jellofishi.com

Reply 6 of 27, by Dominus

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For info, the installation of the 'Ultima Collection' heavily uses xcopy to install the games to the HD

But that's a Windows installer if I'm not mistaken.

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Reply 9 of 27, by megs8888

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Hi excuse my stupidity but im new to this i followed your instructions and then opened dosbox and the line command now reads

Z:\>path Z:\ ; C :\xcopy
Z:\>

Is that right now how do I install the actual game disworld I have pasted the CD contents to C:\oldgames\discworld

do i have to install xcopy or anything from the zip file or will that do itself thanks

Reply 10 of 27, by MiniMax

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Do you have that XCOPY.EXE file in the C:\xcopy directory?

What do the command

Z:\>xcopy

give you?

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Reply 14 of 27, by DosFreak

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I doubt it will be included but I think I remember hearing Qbix say that he wanted to offer downloads (like HD images and utilities) that people could use in DosBox. Not sure if he plans on doing that.

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Reply 18 of 27, by gamblor

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hey! i know i'm digging up an old one, but i recently used this guide and i think I may have found some issues.

i used xcopy to install a game in dosbox, and it handled most things fine. i think it may run into problems though when xcopy is in a situation where it must create subdirectories. i will illustrate with some lines from the output file the game created after installation.

for every situation where it copies a file to a previously created installation directory, it gives an output like this. when i physically go to this directory after installation, the file is indeed there.

D:\ESPNBB\162_28.S                                                       38,453

for the most part, the entire output file consisted of lines looking like this. however, there are a series of 10 or so lines at the end saying the following.

XXCOPY  == Freeware ==    Ver 2.93.1  (c)1995-2006 Pixelab, Inc.



Invalid destination directory name

i am not 100% certain, but i think the issue may be that a subdirectory must be created, and it does not currently exist while xcopy is running. i was hoping that it would say what files it was attempting to copy when encountering these errors, but it did not.

any pointers or workaround would be a great help. even if not, i figured it would be good to bring this issue to your attention.

Reply 19 of 27, by MiniMax

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Maybe you need some option to XCOPY, like /S for it to create the directories?

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