# DOS Timer



## speedcuber50 (May 14, 2013)

Hi!

I'm not sure if any of you would be interested in this...

A little while ago, my timer's batteries ran flat and it was a while before I could get some new ones. As a result, I found myself developing a computer-based timer to use in the meantime.

The timer has many functions, such as the ability to sort and list times, calculate a mean, median, or special mean (like a 3 of 5 or 10 of 12 average where the best and worst times are omitted) and even customize the colour and layout of the timer's display!

My one hesitation is that it is based around MS-DOS. In fact, I specially made it so that it fits on a boot floppy so that I don't have to wait for Windows to load every time I want to use it. I just pop the floppy in, turn the computer on and in 30 seconds I'm solving my cube (no pun intended  ).

Is anyone interested in software made for such out-of-date platforms?

speedcuber50


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## jfly (May 15, 2013)

This sounds like an awesome project, and I would love to play with it.


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## AvGalen (May 15, 2013)

> I just pop the floppy in, turn the computer on and in 30 seconds I'm solving my cube



Sounds like an interesting project, but most people don't have floppy disks anymore and my computer with Windows 8 coldboots in about 10 seconds and comes out of standby in about 2 seconds. And that is slow compared to phones and tablets. So I don't think there will be a lot of people anymore with hardware/software that would use this.

Also, DOS doesn't have any form of powermanagement, so if you are going to run this on a laptop it will suck your battery dry quite quickly.
And finally, MS-DOS is not gratis/free so if you are thinking that you can distribute this as a unit (floppy+OS+program) you might want to think again (and you might want to include http://www.freedos.org/ in that thinking).

Enjoy your project, but make sure you are doing it because you enjoy it.

Would this program also work in a command prompt in Windows or are you writing low level code that would read out the timer directly?


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## speedcuber50 (May 15, 2013)

DOS is free; you can make a DOS boot disk from Windows XP. In any case, will MS-DOS software be compatible with FreeDOS?

I suppose it could run under Windows as there's really no low-level code (I've actually tried it before), but I kind of liked the idea of fitting an all-in-one timer package on a boot floppy. Also, my PC does not start as fast as yours.

By the way, it's also possible to make this run on a flash drive or even an external hard drive.

I'm surprised I even got a response! (BTW I'm into old computers quite a bit!)


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## qqwref (May 15, 2013)

speedcuber50 said:


> BTW I'm into old computers quite a bit!


That would explain it. I know haven't used a floppy in over a decade and my computer (and my last one) doesn't even have a floppy drive. It could probably run DOS, but I'd prefer having a little graphical C app (or something similar) sitting in a window so I can do other stuff while I'm cubing. I certainly wouldn't want to devote my entire computer to being a timer.

That said, it's an interesting idea and probably something nobody's done before, so it'd probably be worth releasing, if you're willing


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## speedcuber50 (May 15, 2013)

OK, I've downloaded FreeDOS, loaded my timer onto the boot disk, set it to run at startup, and now it works under FreeDOS!

Disk image to follow...


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## speedcuber50 (May 15, 2013)

I can't get the attachment uploader to work...


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## speedcuber50 (May 16, 2013)

Still won't work...

I thought it was becuase I was using SphereXPlorer, but it doesn't work in a normal browser either  .

I click the "Manage Attachments" button, but I just get a blank window with nowhere to upload the attachment.


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## Schmidt (May 16, 2013)

It has to do with the skin you are using. Search for it in the announcement thread.

EDIT: Try this
http://www.speedsolving.com/forum/forum.php?styleid=27


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## speedcuber50 (May 16, 2013)

That link works, but unfortunately I can't compress the file small enough!


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## qqwref (May 16, 2013)

Just upload it somewhere else. Speedsolving is really not designed for sharing files.


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## speedcuber50 (May 16, 2013)

I don't have anywhere else to upload it. (I think we had this last time I made some cube software.)


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## qqwref (May 16, 2013)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_hosting_services


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## timeless (May 17, 2013)

speedcuber50 said:


> I don't have anywhere else to upload it. (I think we had this last time I made some cube software.)



try dropbox or maybe skydrive?


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## AvGalen (May 17, 2013)

How about just the DOS program without the OS?


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## speedcuber50 (May 24, 2013)

Today I added an inspection time feature.

You press any key to activate the countdown. After 7 seconds the computer beeps, and again after 12 seconds (just like in the WCA rules!). After 15 seconds the computer beeps once more and the timer starts. If any key is pressed before 15 seconds, the timer starts immediately.

Obviously, you can switch the inspection time off if not desired.


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