I have compiled these disks of important Public Domain PC Utility programs because I think that all PC Users need them.

Frankly I think it's a real shame that MicroSoft didn't include many of these functions in MS-DOS.

Various software authors agree, so they've written these programs and either donated them to the public domain, or ask you to send them some money if you find yourself using the program (Freeware).

MS-DOS v6.22 is a big improvement over v5.00 which was a HUGE improvement over MS-DOS v1.0, v2.11. v3.3, v4.01 etc., but that doesn't eliminate the need for these programs. To the best of my observations the command line aspect of Windows95 is a slightly updated version of MS-DOS v6.22. The same should be expected of Win97 whenever it arrives.

Some of this stuff is here simply because it's fun.

The Public Domain/Freeware universe is huge.

If you investigate it, you will find THOUSANDS of Gigabytes of programs being distributed via this medium.

In these day of the Internet, The World Wide Web, 33,600 BAUD and 56,000 BAUD modems, with home and corporate Internet links going 750,000 to 1,500,000 BPS or faster, it's important to remember the times when public domain software was distributed via long distance calls at 1,200 and 2,400 BAUD.

The OverByte Utilities are a simply my own distillation of that universe into a carefully tested collection of Utility Programs that I have compiled to supply free to my customers as ``a good start on a long road.''

I Hope you enjoy them, and share them with your friends and colleagues.

I recommend that you install these programs in two new subdirectories on your hard disk:

\PD	Public Domain - a place to store these programs. This directory should become a part of your PATH.
\PD\DOC	Instructions for using the OverByte Utilities (OVBDOC.EXE) are stored here. There is no need to make this part of you PATH.

If you see a program you are curious about, just type it's name in at the MS-DOS command line prompt. It's probably a good idea to print out the file: -Files.txt as a guide to the programs you'll find here in the OverByte Utilities Collection

Scott Rainey
Webwheels Corporation
P. O. Box 6500
Portland OR 97228-6500
503.452.7700