Executor FAQ - Section 3
Using Executor

Question 3.1. Where are the Cmd (Clover) and Option keys?

On a PC keyboard, Executor uses the left "Alt" key as a Cmd key and the right "Alt" key as the Option key.

Question 3.2. What is an image file?

Some Macintosh sites contain image files that are exact copies of a Macintosh Hierarchical FileSystem (HFS) volume with a few bytes of header information prepended. Executor allows you to use image files just like HFVs, although they should have the suffix ".ima" instead of ".hfv".

Question 3.3. Can I launch applications directly from the command line?

Yes. If an application resides within a UNIX or DOS filesystem, you can specify the name of the application, and documents that you would like the application to open when it starts up, on the command line. Applications that reside in HFV files are specified using colons to delimit the pathname, e.g. "executor MyVolume:directory:application".

Question 3.4. I installed a font in Executor, but I still can't print in it. What's the deal?

You have to install the same font in Ghostscript. Otherwise, Ghostscript will use the default Helvetica font since it can't find the one you want. Don't forget to add the paths to the fonts into your fonts pfb file.

Question 3.5. Can I have Executor use more than 8 MB for the application zone?

You can use up to 64 MB for the applzone.

Question 3.6. An application I'm trying crashes. What should I do?

Perhaps the most common avoidable cause of crashes is insufficient memory for the emulated application. You can fix this by increasing the "applzone" parameter. For example, many programs which normally die quickly will work with "executor -applzone 4m" (which allocates 4 MB of space for the emulated application; see the list of command line switches and their meanings elsewhere in this document).

DOS NOTE: If you run "executor -info", it will tell you how much DPMI memory is available and how much memory is being used by the applzone, syszone and stack. If there is less DPMI memory available than the sum of the applzone, syszone and stack memory requirements, then Executor will page between DPMI memory and a special "paging" disk file. This paging slows you down and also consumes disk space. It is possible to manually override the applzone, syszone and stack defaults with smaller values, but when you do so, you run the risk of not having enough memory for an application to run. Unfortunately, Macintosh programs are often not polite at all when they do not have enough memory. The Lemmings demo is an example of such a program; if you run that program on a real Mac and only give it 1200k of memory, weird errors will occur. Doing the same under Executor will also yield weird errors.

If Executor needs to make a paging file, and there is not enough disk space to create one, you will get an error message during Executor's startup. If you have the environment variable "TEMP" set, then Executor will try to place its paging file there, so if TEMP is set to point to a small RAM disk, or a disk that is nearly filled, Executor may run out of memory too easily.

Some programs are unhappy with Executor's limited sound support, and crash. You can turn on the "pretend sound" option before running the application in question and see if this helps. In addition, some programs have menu items, or preference check boxes that can be used to disable sound. It is always recommended that you disable sound from within a program in addition to using the Executor sound preferences, if you have to disable sound.

One example of a program that will have problems with sound is "Ultimate Solitaire". If you do not disable sound from within Ultimate Solitaire, the game will play fine, until you win. At that point it will tell Executor to start playing a sound and request that Executor notify it when the sound is done playing. If sound is off, this will result in Ultimate Solitaire hanging after you win a game.

Some programs also save preferences in a file, and if something bad happens to that file, the program can then get confused and will not run properly. Occasionally this happens to Microsoft Word, and you need to use the browser to delete the file "Word Preferences" from your "System Folder".

Although it should not happen, even our file browser keeps a file around that can cause trouble if it becomes corrupt. That file is "godata.sav". It stores which folders you have open and the contents of your "hot-band". If that file gets corrupt, the file browser may not run. In the rare case that the browser won't run, you can use the "-nobrowser" switch when you start Executor to bypass the browser, but to get the browser back you'll need to either delete "godata.sav" somehow or replace exsystem.hfv with one from the original distribution.

Question 3.7. Why do some applications claim I don't have an FPU?

The problem is probably that the applications you are trying to use try to directly manipulate the FPU unit that some Macintoshes have.

The key words are "directly manipulate". Apple warned software makers to not directly manipulate the FPU, but to instead use their numerics library ("SANE" Standard Apple Numerics Environment). Programs that don't use SANE, but directly manipulate the FPU run faster on Macs that have FPUs, but don't run at all on Macs that don't have FPUs. If that is actually the source of your problems, then such programs also wouldn't run on Apple machines like the Quadra 605. This limitation is also present on Apple's PowerPC based Macs.

One workaround for this problem is an "INIT" called "SoftFPU". SoftFPU will make a Mac without a co-processor work as though there is one there, however the floating point computation will be done very slowly. However, SoftFPU can't be used with Executor until Executor supports INITs.

Question 3.8. Why does Compact Pro have trouble with multi-volume archives?

Executor takes a short cut that causes trouble for some programs; Compact Pro is one of them. The problem is that a real Macintosh can keep track of volumes that are not physically in the drive. That is why Macintoshes sometimes tell you to put one disk in their floppy drive, then they eject it and ask for another one, then eject it and ask for the first one. Executor currently isn't so clever. When a disk is ejected, Executor forgets about it. Few programs count on the behavior of a real Mac, but those that do currently won't work with Executor.

In Compact Pro's case you can just copy all of the pieces of the archive to your hard disk, then open the last piece from the hard disk and everything will work properly. This workaround requires more hard disk space than you'd need if you could just read the pieces off a succession of floppies.

Since this difference affects very few programs, it's not as high priority as adding other new features.

Question 3.9. How can I use Mac software from the internet?

Find a site that legitimately has Mac software for use. There is a Macintosh FAQ that lists many sites -- here are some of them:

Our samples directory is there to give you a few files in a variety of different formats that are known to work with Executor. If you have trouble downloading Mac software from the internet, you may want to practice these instructions using the files in our samples directory first, so you'll know you're not attempting something impossible.

Before transferring a large application, you might want to see what the requirements of that application are, most sites have a collection of small notes about applications that you can look at first.

Use BINARY mode to transfer the files that you want to use. Files whose names end in ".hqx" are usually the easiest to handle.

In general, StuffIt Expander will do well with many different types of files. However, some of the Web Browsers out there interfere with StuffIt Expander by trying to expand the files as you're downloading them from the net. The browser sees that you're not running on a Macintosh, so the non-Macintosh information (like the type and creator) is thrown away! One way to avoid this problem with some of the web browsers is to hold the shift key down when you click on a link that contains a Macintosh file. There are other ways that specific browsers can be configured to tell them to not expand Macintosh files as they're picking them up.

Under DOS, you need to make an HFV file [see Q6.2 `What is makehfv?'] that will be large enough to hold the files as you've downloaded them and also hold the files after they've been expanded. Once you've made the HFV file, copy all the files you've downloaded into it, then follow the remaining directions.

Under all operating systems, your next step is to run StuffIt Expander and use the "Expand..." menu item from the "File" menu to open each of the files you've downloaded. In general, especially when dealing with files whose names end in ".hqx", StuffIt Expander will do the right thing. However, some sites do not store files in ".hqx" format, and StuffIt Expander may fail. Remember, under DOS, you must do the StuffIt Expansion inside an HFV file.

If StuffIt Expander fails, you can try using the Get Info option of Executor's browser to change the creator and type information of the file. If you believe the downloaded file in question is a StuffIt Archive, you can change the type and creator each to "SIT!" and then try StuffIt Expander again. If you believe the downloaded file is a Compact Pro archive, you can change the creator to "CPCT" and the type to "PACT" and then try StuffIt Expander again. Similarly, you can use creator "BnHq" and type "TEXT" if you think that the file is a MacBinary file. StuffIt Expander 4.0 should be much better at automatically determining what format an archive is in.

Question 3.10. How can I use Mac software from Bulletin Boards?

In general, follow the procedure in Q3.9 `How can I use Mac software from the internet?' -- know the limitations of what Executor can run, transfer in binary mode and use StuffIt Expander to unpack the files you download. Just like with files downloaded from the internet, sometimes you'll need to change the file type and creator, first.

Question 3.11. How can I use Mac software from AOL?

AOL sometimes (about half the time) uses a format that StuffIt Expander under Executor has trouble with. For DOS/Windows users, use this workaround. Get a copy of unstuff.exe (available on AOL compressed as unsitins.exe) and use the -mb tag to convert your downloaded files to MacBinary format before ever moving them into Executor. E.g.: 
unstuff -mb somefile.sit

And you'll get somefile with a different extension.

Then start up Executor and use BinHex's Download --> Application function to convert the file to an application and move it into an Executor volume simultaneously.

Note that if the file can be unstuffed in the usual manner, then trying to use this workaround will break it. It's usually best, therefore, to try normal unstuffing first.

Question 3.12. Why do files which aren't text files look like text files?

Macintosh files have File Type and File Creator information stored in their directory entries on a Macintosh filesystem. These two pieces of information are often lost when the file is put onto a PC. Executor's default is to assume that a file is a text file, because text is the most universal of file types. If the file is not a text file you'll probably want to use StuffIt Expander (see Q3.9 `How can I use Mac software from the internet?') to expand the archive, or in rare cases you'll have to change the File Creator and File Type.

To change a file's Creator and Type information, run Browser, select the file's icon, and choose Get Info from Browser's File menu. Then change File Creator and File Type to the appropriate codes from the filetype.txt list in the docs directory of your Executor CD.

NOTE: in addition to having Type and Creator information, Macintosh files also often have information in the "Resource Fork" portion of the file. That information is also often lost when a file is transferred to a PC, so it's possible that changing the Type and Creator information will not be sufficient to allow you to use a Mac file on a PC under Executor unless you use some sort of archiving program (e.g. StuffIt, Compact Pro) to make sure all the Mac information is stored in the "Data Fork" of the file.

Question 3.13. What does "You may open a 32000 character selection" mean?

As mentioned in Q3.12 `Why do files which aren't text files look like text files?', files that don't have a file type are assumed to be text files. That means that if you double-click on them, Tex-Edit will try to open up the file, even if the file is in some other representation. Executor does not use filename extensions to determine a file's types, so if you download a file named "testfile.bin" and then let Executor see the file, it will still appear to be a text file, even though the name strongly suggests that it's a BinHex file.

You can use StuffIt Expander (see Q3.9 `How can I use Mac software from the internet?') to expand a variety of different file types, but you'll have to start StuffIt Expander up directly, by double-clicking on it and then use the "Expand..." item in the "File" menu to select the file you want to expand (e.g. "testfile.bin").

Question 3.14. What is Speedometer?

Speedometer is a shareware application that we have included with Executor for demonstrational purposes. We have done so with permission of Speedometer's author, Scott Berfield. It benchmarks Macintoshes (and PCs running Executor) to find out how quickly their CPU, graphics, floating point and disk subsystems work. The current version of Speedometer is Speedometer 4.x, but that uses a timing mechanism that Executor currently doesn't support. Speedometer 3.23 can give you a rough approximation of how quickly your PC is emulating a Mac. Remember, Speedometer is shareware, and ARDI has not paid the shareware fee for you. If you repeatedly use Speedometer, please register it with Scott.

Speedometer will show you that Executor is a very efficient emulator. Please note, ARDI has not put special hooks into Executor to recognize Speedometer's code and bypass it; Speedometer is treated just like any other application when run under Executor. Yes, it would be possible for us to cheat and make Speedometer return values that are higher than you could expect to see in real life, but we don't do that sort of thing.

Question 3.15. How can I get a screen dump of Executor?

Just type Cmd-Shift-3, just like on a Mac. The difference is that the screen shot will be in TIFF format (uncompressed, for now) and will be written in the directory that contains executor.exe under DOS, or in /tmp under Linux.

Question 3.16. How does your Browser show file size?

Listing mode will show you the combined size of a file's resource and data fork. There is currently no way to determine the size of a folder.

Question 3.17. How does your Browser show free space?

Select the volume, then choose "Get Info" from the File menu.

Question 3.18. Why does Browser display question marks for some documents?

Browser uses the question-mark icon for documents for which it doesn't recognize the file type and creator. Furthermore, Browser isn't good about remembering type and creator information.

Here's how Browser works: when Browser starts, it examines each application that is either on the hot-band or is in a folder that is open on Browser's desktop. Then, as it is drawing the icons for documents, it only uses icons for those applications that it saw upon startup.

So, if the application that creates a document isn't either on the hot-band or in an open folder, browser will present a question-mark icon. A real Mac remembers any icons that it has ever seen (until you rebuild the desktop).

If you have the application that corresponds to the document that has a question mark, you can get rid of the question mark by dragging the application onto the hot-band and then quitting Executor and restarting (or by running an application and then quitting the application). When Browser restarts it will see the application in the hot-band and then remember the icon that should be used for documents of that type.

Next: Executor/Win32.
Back: Executor's Limitations.
Return to contents.

- 28 February 2002

Extracted from Executor Frequently Asked Questions with Answers, Copyright ARDI 2002.