Setup Adds MS-DOS Directory to Every PATH Statement (96152)



The information in this article applies to:
    Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.0
    Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.2
    Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.21
    Microsoft MS-DOS operating system 6.22

This article was previously published under Q96152

SUMMARY

MS-DOS Setup adds the MS-DOS directory to every PATH statement in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file. For example, if Setup finds the following lines in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file

path c:\dos;c:\windows
path %path%;c:\c700\bin

it adds "c:\dos" to the second line even though the MS-DOS directory is already present in the first line. The lines appear as follows:

path c:\dos;c:\windows
path c:\dos;%path%;c:\c700;c:\bin

MORE INFORMATION

If your MS-DOS directory is in the path twice, some applications may not behave as expected. For example, Windows Setup finds MS-DOS-based applications twice when it searches your hard disk based on the path.

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in MS-DOS versions 6.0, 6.2, and 6.21. We are researching this problem and will post new information here in the Microsoft Knowledge Base as it becomes available.

Modification Type: Major Last Reviewed: 11/26/1999
Keywords: KB96152