Microsoft KB Archive/101403

= PC WSPlus: Running SCHDIST.EXE as Idle Process in Dispatch =

Article ID: 101403

Article Last Modified on 8/16/2005

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Schedule+ 1.0 Standard Edition
 * Microsoft Schedule+ 1.0a

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This article was previously published under Q101403



SUMMARY
Versions 1.0 and 1.0a of Microsoft Schedule+ for Windows use the Schedule Distribution (Schdist) program (SCHDIST.EXE) to distribute a user's free and busy times to other postoffices. You can run the Schdist program as an idle process in the Dispatch program (DISPATCH.EXE).

The Dispatch program carries out directory synchronization (Dir-Sync) requests on the network. The Dispatch program polls the postoffices to determine when a Dir-Sync event is scheduled to take place. When Dispatch is running, the External Mail program (EXTERNAL.EXE) must also be running.

Schdist takes advantage of Dispatch polling the postoffices, and runs as an idle process. Schdist runs while External is not active.



MORE INFORMATION
The following examples show commands and batch files for using SCHDIST.EXE and EXTERNAL.EXE as idle processes in DISPATCH.EXE for two different scenarios:   If you want Dispatch to contain the IdleProcessMinPeriod (-TL) and IdleProcessMaxPeriod (-TU) parameters, use the following command line DISPATCH -Dmp -I"file.bat" -TL30 -TU60 -Lc:\logs\mail.log where -Dxx specifies the direct drives, -I specifies the idle program, and -L specifies the log file path and filename. To have Schdist running as an idle process, include SCHDIST.EXE in a batch file. For example:

DISPATCH -Dmp -I"file.bat" -TL30 -TU60 -Lc:\logs\mail.log

The FILE.BAT batch file would look like the following: SCHDIST.EXE -Dxx -I1 -Lc:\logs\schdist.txt EXTERNAL.EXE -Dxx -A -Lc:\logs\external.txt %1 NOTE: Refer to 101752 "PC Ext: Dispatch Cannot Spawn Batch File

Without COMMAND.COM" for information if you are having problems running this batch file against Microsoft Mail for PC Networks postoffices with MS-DOS 5.0.

NOTE: In this setup, the -TU time in the Dispatch command line is passed to the External command line. This parameter essentially becomes the -BR (break relative) time that exits out of External and passes control back to Dispatch.   If you want the batch file to control the time for exiting out of the idle process, use the following command line: DISPATCH -Dxx -I" .bat" -L For example:

DISPATCH -Dmn -I"file.bat" -Lc:\logs\mail.log

The FILE.BAT batch file would look like the following: SCHDIST.EXE -Dxx -I1 -Lc:\logs\schdist.txt EXTERNAL.EXE -Dxx -A -Lc:\logs\external.txt -BRdd:hh: Notes

In this setup, the -BR (break relative) time determines when External exits and passes control back to Dispatch.

You must remove the -A parameter in the External command line if you are using a modem. You should only use placeholder if the SCHDIST.EXE and EXTERNAL.EXE files are not in the current directory. It is best if you copy the following files to a directory on the dedicated machine that will run this process (MS-DOS only):      DISPATCH.EXE     NSDA.EXE           REQMAIN.EXE SRVMAIN.EXE     REBUILD.EXE        IMPORT.EXE EXTERNAL.EXE    ASYNC.OVL          EXTERNAL.HLP EXTERNAL.ERR    X25EICON.OVL       X25ATLAN.OVL SCHDIST.EXE 

