Chapter
1
INTRODUCTION
The disk-oriented Commodore Computer System was designed around the central concept
of providingyou, the user, with largefile-handling capabilitiessupported by
BASIC
pro
gramming commands and further simplified by DOSSupport command abbreviations.
Read the Tableof Contents and becomeacquaintedwith the broad scopeof material
covered
in thismanual. It hasbeen
designed
to
assist
you in
pursuing
an educational pro
gram
by
utilizing
the
computer
asan
adjunct
to the
learning
process.
That
is,
once
the
disk
driveis properlyinterfacedto a Commodore Computer,
YOU
become as important an ele
mentof the
system
asthe
hardware.
Your
importance,
however,
is
measured
in directrela
tionship to how
well
you understand howto effectively utilizethe hardware
arid
software.
That's why it is best to think of your computer and disk drive as only part of a system.
Grasping
andunderstanding the conceptthat each
individual
component actsandreactsto
signals
and
commands
from
other
devices
inthe
system
will
greatly
accelerate
your
funda
mental
grasp
of how to operate, control, and master the system.This basicconcept forms
the
basis
of this manual: teachingyou how to gainmastery of the systemso that it
will
perform
as
desired.
Thatisthe
primary
reason
this
manual
is
laid
out ina
building
block
fashion: it permits you to advance as fast as
you
desire.
The first chapters discuss basichardwarefeatures and permit you, right from the start, to
become familiar with
the
disk drive by doing the performance tests which comprise the first
essential"hands
on"
experience. Then, by actually usingyour particular diskdrive and
learning to carefullyfollowinstructions,you can
gain
confidencein order to proceedto
more
comprehensive
subjects.
Bythe time you
begin
Chapter
3—Learning
HowTo
Use
Your Floppy DiskDrive-you
will
havealready used some portions of the DOSSupport system which is not fully described
until Chapter 7. The reason for this procedure lies within the purpose of DOSSupport:
simplifying commands.It isactually easierto instruct a new user by
using
the simplified
command structure of DOS Support than attempting to explain the entire command hier
archy at an early stage.This concept of providingyou with enough essentialinformation to
complete a task, a step-by-stepdescription of the task, and meaningfulexamplesis a feature
of this manual which will provide
you
with sufficient incentive
to
actually complete
the
task.