BAT2EXEC

File Format
Name	BAT2EXEC
Ontology	Electronic File Formats Executable envelopes BAT2EXEC
Released	1990

BAT2EXEC is a DOS utility that converts a Batch file to a COM file that (hopefully) works the same. It was developed by Ziff Communications and Douglas Boling.

It was originally released via an article in the August 1990 issue of PC Magazine.

Discussion

More research is needed regarding version 1.0. There are probably at least two versions of it, with one named "BAT2COM" instead of "BAT2EXEC".

Identification

Files compiled by v1.2-1.3 start with bytes assembled from the "INIT CODE" section of the source code, observed to be these 32 bytes:

fc bd 20 01 8b 6e 00 8b a6 02 00 8b 9e 04 00 b4
4a cd 21 a1 2c 00 89 86 1a 00 8b 9e 00 00 ff e3

Files compiled by v1.5 have an ASCII signature at offset 3: "Compiled by BAT2EXEC 1.5".

Software

• BAT2EXEC/BAT2COM v1.0
• BAT2EXEC v1.2
• BAT2EXEC v1.3
• BAT2EXEC v1.5

Sample files

• CCAL9116.ZIP → EQ.COM
• BOOTLOG2.ZIP → LOGTIME.COM
• SZV102F.ZIP → ZIPVIEW.COM

Links

• Original BAT2EXEC article in PC Magazine, Aug. 1990, p. 415