Hm. Maybe the :start must be at the very beginning of the line, not sure.
From what I can see, a space character is present. Maybe DOS 3.x can't handle this.
Edit: Also try a capital letter (:Start or :Begin)..

Otherwise, this shoukd work. :
https://www.robvanderwoude.com/goto.php

I'm sorry, I played around with batch files when I was little.
But on a 286 with MS-DOS 6.2, mainly.
PC-DOS 3.30 was cool, though. So small, so quick. And not from Microsoft.

Also, it could run Windows 2.03 without the need to fake an older DOS version. 😁

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-21, 03:09:

Hm. Maybe the :start must be at the very beginning of the line, not sure. From what I can see, a space character is present. May […]
Show full quote

Hm. Maybe the :start must be at the very beginning of the line, not sure.
From what I can see, a space character is present. Maybe DOS 3.x can't handle this.
Edit: Also try a capital letter (:Start or :Begin)..

Otherwise, this shoukd work. :
https://www.robvanderwoude.com/goto.php

I'm sorry, I played around with batch files when I was little.
But on a 286 with MS-DOS 6.2, mainly.
PC-DOS 3.30 was cool, though. So small, so quick. And not from Microsoft.

Also, it could run Windows 2.03 without the need to fake an older DOS version. 😁

Tried the no space thing yesterday already bto no avail. It just outputs the 3 echo lines and then also echo's "Goto start" as if it does not know what to do with it.. but it doesn't echo the ":start" line so I assume (as it doesn't give any error either on bad commands) it does handle that part fine..

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-21, 03:09:

PC-DOS 3.30 was cool, though. So small, so quick. And not from Microsoft.

I got bad news for you.

What version of DOS exactly are you running (show output of "ver")? Both PC/MS-DOS 3.3 support the goto/label batch commands and it does work fine locally when I try it.

JudgeMonroe wrote on 2020-09-21, 14:54:

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-21, 03:09:

PC-DOS 3.30 was cool, though. So small, so quick. And not from Microsoft.

I got bad news for you.

?

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-21, 15:19:

JudgeMonroe wrote on 2020-09-21, 14:54:

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-21, 03:09:

PC-DOS 3.30 was cool, though. So small, so quick. And not from Microsoft.

I got bad news for you.

?

It's from Microsoft.

JudgeMonroe wrote on 2020-09-21, 15:00:

What version of DOS exactly are you running (show output of "ver")? Both PC/MS-DOS 3.3 support the goto/label batch commands and it does work fine locally when I try it.

It is DOS 3.20 (I thought it was 3.30 honestly but there you go) Shouldn't matter however:

Quote:
The Goto command transfers execution to a specified label. Labels are specified at the beginning of a line, with a colon (:likethis).
The command is available in MS-DOS versions 2 and later.

Planet-Dune wrote on 2020-09-21, 18:00:

It is DOS 3.20 (I thought it was 3.30 honestly but there you go) Shouldn't matter however: […]
Show full quote

It is DOS 3.20 (I thought it was 3.30 honestly but there you go) Shouldn't matter however:

Quote:
The Goto command transfers execution to a specified label. Labels are specified at the beginning of a line, with a colon (:likethis).
The command is available in MS-DOS versions 2 and later.

Labels do work in 3.2. You can easily verify it by using a non-existent label and you'll get a message similar to "label not found"
However jumping to an earlier part of the file is not supported, only going forward. This works (and doesn't echo anything of course):

1goto end
2echo asdf
3:end

From 3.3 and onwards you can jump to a label anywhere in the file

There's another problem with 3.2 and batch files though, which I believe you have already experienced: you can't use @ to hide the command executed. So you must be seeing on screen

1echo abc
2abc
3echo def
4def

etc

konc wrote on 2020-09-21, 19:01:

Labels do work in 3.2. You can easily verify it by using a non-existent label and you'll get a message similar to "label not fou […]
Show full quote

Planet-Dune wrote on 2020-09-21, 18:00:

It is DOS 3.20 (I thought it was 3.30 honestly but there you go) Shouldn't matter however: […]
Show full quote

It is DOS 3.20 (I thought it was 3.30 honestly but there you go) Shouldn't matter however:

Quote:
The Goto command transfers execution to a specified label. Labels are specified at the beginning of a line, with a colon (:likethis).
The command is available in MS-DOS versions 2 and later.

Labels do work in 3.2. You can easily verify it by using a non-existent label and you'll get a message similar to "label not found"
However jumping to an earlier part of the file is not supported, only going forward. This works (and doesn't echo anything of course):

Copy code to clipboard

1goto end
2echo asdf
3:end

From 3.3 and onwards you can jump to a label anywhere in the file

There's another problem with 3.2 and batch files though, which I believe you have already experienced: you can't use @ to hide the command executed. So you must be seeing on screen

Copy code to clipboard

1echo abc
2abc
3echo def
4def

etc

But if you can only jump forward you cannot do a loop right? Or am I missing something? The whole point of going backwards is that you repeat something that already happened.

Planet-Dune wrote on 2020-09-21, 19:29:

But if you can only jump forward you cannot do a loop right? Or am I missing something? The whole point of going backwards is that you repeat something that already happened.

If I remember correctly, if you start a second batch file from a batch file without using the CALL command, it's actually jumping to the batch file, and there is no stack that can overflow. So if you re-start the batch file at the end by just invoking it, you should guess your endless loop.

Hi! Why not just upgrade to DOS 3.30?
Is the installed version of 3.2 a special OEM version, by any chance?

JudgeMonroe wrote on 2020-09-21, 15:28:

Jo22 wrote on 2020-09-21, 15:19:

JudgeMonroe wrote on 2020-09-21, 14:54:

I got bad news for you.

?

It's from Microsoft.

Oh. Well, it somehow had to be, I guess. 🙁
Though PC-DOS 3.x started the independant development of IBM-DOS, maybe.
If memory serves, the programmers at IBM started to do changes on their own at this time.

Edit: http://www.os2museum.com/wp/dos/dos-3-3/

Planet-Dune wrote on 2020-09-21, 19:29:

But if you can only jump forward you cannot do a loop right? Or am I missing something? The whole point of going backwards is that you repeat something that already happened.

Correct, I don't know if there is any other way to loop in a batch file in 3.2, but considering the second problem you'll face I didn't even bother to search.
I think you'll be better off writing (or having someone write for you) a small program that outputs to screen, it's literally only a couple of lines.
btw I believe that if you see the batch file approach actually running on a newer dos you won't be that satisfied with it, but that's another discussion

Not sure about dos 3.2 specifically but that should work, and you should be able to jump backwards... maybe 'start' is a reserved word?

Nevermind read Konc's post.

Any news?

From what I remember, there used to be batch file compilers that turned batch files into *.com and *.exe files. 😀
They were available at the usual shareware, freeware and public domain sources.