Setting up Quicken 6 for DOS in DOSEMU on a USB Mint Cinnamon SSD, with USB backup capability.

[VP9KS]

This procedure will also work for installed Solid State drives.



This installation assumes that you have a USB Thumb drive with all your Quicken 6 data files backed up on it, along with some type of media containing all the quicken 6 program files. It also assumes that you have Laplink 5. If you do not have Laplink 5, you will need to use the dos file editor to edit the autoexec.bat file, and remember how to use dos commands such as change directory, copy files, make directory… Etc. Have a DOS manual handy. Using Laplink is much quicker and easier.



Step 1

Install Mint cinnamon on the solid state drive, and complete all updates.

Step 2

Install “DOSEMU” from the Synaptic Package Manager. Create a shortcut for it on the desktop.

Step 3

Create a “Scratch” folder in the Home folder.

Step 4

Create “quicken6” and “ll5” sub folders inside the newly created “Scratch” folder.

Step 5

Copy the “Quicken 6” files to the new “/home/scratch/quicken6” folder, and “Laplink 5” files to the “/home/scratch/ll5” folder. The “scratch” folder, and its 2 sub folders, will be viewable in the DOSEMU “D” drive. This is how we will get them inside “DOSEMU”.

Step 6

Start DOSEMU. In the “C” drive, create “quicken”, quicken6”, and “ll5” folders. The program files will be in the “quicken6” folder. The data files will be in the “quicken” folder.

Step 7

Change to the “D” drive by using the D: command. (NOT D:\ as in regular DOS)

Step 8

Change to the “Scratch\ll5” directory. Issue the command LL5/50. This will start Laplink 5 in the 50 column mode.

Step 9

Select c:\quicken6 on the left side of the screen, and d:\quicken6 on the right side of the screen.

Step 9

On the right side of the screen, (the D:\quicken6 Folder) use the space bar to select all the files in the folder. Press F2 to copy them to the left side of the screen (C:\Quicken6).

Step 10

On the left side of the screen, select the “ll5” folder (C:\ll5). On the right side of the screen, select the “ll5” folder (D:\ll5). Use the space bar to select all the files in the folder, and press F2 to copy them to the left side of the screen (C:\ll5).

Step 11

On the right side of the screen, select “Incoming connection”. On the left side of the screen, go to the root of the C drive (C:\) . Move the curser down to highlight the “Autoexec.bat” file. Press the “ALT’ key to enable the top left menu. Select “edit” and edit again. This will open the line editor.

Step 12

While in the line editor add the following statements to the end of the “path” command

c:\;c:\quicken;c:\quicken6;c:\ll5 .

Step 13

While still in the line editor, add the following statement to the end of the autoexec.bat q.exe.

Step 14

Change the “LREDIR” line to read LREDIR E: Linux\FS/media/Computer Name/Thumb drive Name

This means the name of your computer, and the name of your backup thumb drive.

Step 15

Save the modified “autoexec.bat” file, exit the editor, and exit laplink.

Step 16

Exit DOSEMU. In the home directory, delete the “Scratch” folder and all its contents. Plug your backup thumb drive into the computer. Double click on the DOSEMU Icon on the Desktop, and you should go right into quicken6.

Step 17

Exit quicken6, and issue the command ll5/50 to enter laplink. On the left side of the screen, select the path c:\quicken, and on the right side of the screen, select the backup thumb drive. Use the space bar to select all files on the backup thumb drive, and press F2 to copy them to the c:\quicken folder. Now you have all the data files in DOSEMU.

Step18

Exit laplink and quit dosemu. Insure that the backup thumb drive is unprotected and inserted into the computer. Double click on the DOSEMU icon to start Quicken6, and set it up for normal use, including backup.



The backup USB thumb drive must be plugged in before starting DOSEMU, and remain plugged in the entire time Quicken 6 is running. If not, you will not be able to do your backup.

Happy Trails,
Paul

 

[KGIII]

I assume you're just using this to do your bookkeeping and not trying to use it to file your taxes, 'cause there will have been a whole lot of changes to the tax laws since that thing was last updated.

 

[Alexzee]

I tip my hat to you Paul, that was a lot of work.
Kudos to you; you Slacker!

 

[VP9KS]

I tip my hat to you Paul, that was a lot of work.
Kudos to you; you Slacker!

Yeah, thanks mate. Never mind how long it took me to figure out how to get the backup USB drive to work. That was the LREDIR command. I had never seen that one before, so I ignored it for a few(?) days. Lost a few hairs over that one, so I thought I might try to save someone else the same frustration. It was for my wife. She was doing the same thing on a USB Thumb drive, which suddenly failed after 3.5 years. The problem was, that she did not write down how she did it, so I had to start from scratch. She seemed to remember that she was using DOSEMU, but that was all she remembered.

Once I figured it out, it went very smoothly, thanks to the use of Laplink. I have used that program for many, many years, from the sands of the Persian gulf, all the way to Taiwan, and it has never let me down.

Happy Trails,
Paul

 

[VP9KS]

I assume you're just using this to do your bookkeeping and not trying to use it to file your taxes, 'cause there will have been a whole lot of changes to the tax laws since that thing was last updated.

Yeah, My wife uses it to keep track of expenses and such. I have a 22 tab Spreadsheet that I generated to do the same thing. Lots of programming and linked cells in that one don't ya know. I have been refining it for about 20 years or more. It also has the tax forms built into it, with everything except the tax from the tax table automatically filled in from links. Makes tax time a breeze.

 

[atanere]

Laplink? I haven't thought of that program for... decades!

I used to use Quicken Deluxe 2004 running in WINE (or in Windows), but I've used a simple checkbook program called HomeBank for about 5 or 6 years now, and I am well-pleased with it. You don't need to know 2-column accounting to use it. I run it in Linux, but my wife uses it in Windows and gets the latest data from me on USB.

HomeBank doesn't do any tax prep other than exporting .csv (or .qif) files for income, expenses, and specific categories and time periods (last month, last quarter, last year, etc). This is enough to help me greatly to prepare my notes to take to an accountant every year. But its biggest drawback is that it only has minimal printing support, and no graphs or charts. I usually just export the .csv files and then use LibreOffice to format how I want the data to print.

You'll probably never replace your spreadsheet with it, but your wife might find it an acceptable replacement for Quicken 6. Homebank has been very well maintained and upgraded regularly. The author also takes "wish requests" to enhance it.

Cheers

 

[VP9KS]

Laplink? I haven't thought of that program for... decades!

I used to use Quicken Deluxe 2004 running in WINE (or in Windows), but I've used a simple checkbook program called HomeBank for about 5 or 6 years now, and I am well-pleased with it. You don't need to know 2-column accounting to use it. I run it in Linux, but my wife uses it in Windows and gets the latest data from me on USB.

HomeBank doesn't do any tax prep other than exporting .csv (or .qif) files for income, expenses, and specific categories and time periods (last month, last quarter, last year, etc). This is enough to help me greatly to prepare my notes to take to an accountant every year. But its biggest drawback is that it only has minimal printing support, and no graphs or charts. I usually just export the .csv files and then use LibreOffice to format how I want the data to print.

You'll probably never replace your spreadsheet with it, but your wife might find it an acceptable replacement for Quicken 6. Homebank has been very well maintained and upgraded regularly. The author also takes "wish requests" to enhance it.

Cheers

Ah yes, good old double entry bookkeeping, I remember it well. I took the required 2 semesters of accounting in College, and actually enjoyed it!

I don't think that I could pry that Quicken6 drive out of her hands, if my life depended on it. She finds a program that she likes, and will not change for anything. I attempted to get her to upgrade to quicken 2004 or 2006, but she said that she liked the way the old program looked, and would not budge. Oh, well, I did try. It does seem like a waste to run a dos program on an 8 core CPU with 32Gb of ram though. Oh well!

As far as Laplink 5, well I bought it way back. I had the blue Db25/DB5 double ended serial cable, and the yellow DB25 parallel cable with it, but I seem to have misplaced them somewhere. Bugger!

The spreadsheet has gone through a whole Hockey Sock full of revisions over the years. I have sheets in it for Budget, Income, credit cards, Checking, savings, Money market, 401K, Stock, Net worth, taxes..... 22 in all. I could add graphs or charts if I find a need, but I haven't so far. I keep a blank copy of the spreadsheet, because I start a new one for each year. Any updates I also put in the blank sheet. I have a stack of spiral bound notebooks documenting the changes over the years. Some day I'll need to put all that into the computer, before they fade away. I have been running it in Office 2000 for quite a few years on an old XP laptop, but recently I discovered that adding the SUMIFS command would add a great deal of utility to it. The only problem was that Excell 2000 does not recognise the SUMIFS command, so I went over to the last version of Open Office that would run in Win XP. I just cannot throw away old hardware that still works, it seems like a waste. I have an Officejet G55 that works well with the old laptop too, so printing is not a problem. I haven't found any program that could replace the versitility of my spreadsheet. It is like that old pair of comfortable shoes that you keep repairing because they are "just broken in".
Before I retired, I used spreadsheets for everything at work, it was a running joke in the shop, "paul, do you think that you could put that in a spreadsheet"?

I take it that you and your wife are feeling much better, Stan? Hope so!

Happy Trails,
Paul

 

[atanere]

As far as Laplink 5, well I bought it way back.

She finds a program that she likes, and will not change for anything.

I get that. I paid for a Windows shareware calendar program, WinDates, many moons ago (back in Laplink days), and I won't give it up either. Well, I would give it up if any of the Linux people would come up with a similar product... a calendar that tells you how old someone is on their birth date, or how long they've been married on their anniversary. It doesn't seem that hard, but I've only found one (Rainlendar) that can do this simple feat, and I don't like that one. Oh well, life goes on. I'll keep looking.

I take it that you and your wife are feeling much better, Stan? Hope so!

Yes, we're fine. Thanks for asking!

https://www.dosbox.com/It does seem like a waste to run a dos program on an 8 core CPU with 32Gb of ram though.

Not that it would serve you any better (it might)... but have you tried DOSBox with Quicken 6? I've used it with a very old QRZ CD-ROM... the last one that included birth dates (around 1996). I think it is actually 8-bit DOS-based... Windows stopped running it long ago, even in "compatibility mode." DOSBox was also able to run STSPlus, an old satellite tracking program I used back in the day to track space shuttles. DOSBox has versions for Linux, Windows and Mac.

BTW, HomeBank has a bit better printing capabilities than I mentioned above. They've made some improvements that I hadn't noticed, but it's still not their strong point. Simplicity is their strong point, I think, in case anyone else is interested in a checkbook program.

 

[VP9KS]

I get that. I paid for a Windows shareware calendar program, WinDates, many moons ago (back in Laplink days), and I won't give it up either. Well, I would give it up if any of the Linux people would come up with a similar product... a calendar that tells you how old someone is on their birth date, or how long they've been married on their anniversary. It doesn't seem that hard, but I've only found one (Rainlendar) that can do this simple feat, and I don't like that one. Oh well, life goes on. I'll keep looking.



Yes, we're fine. Thanks for asking!



Not that it would serve you any better (it might)... but have you tried DOSBox with Quicken 6? I've used it with a very old QRZ CD-ROM... the last one that included birth dates (around 1996). I think it is actually 8-bit DOS-based... Windows stopped running it long ago, even in "compatibility mode." DOSBox was also able to run STSPlus, an old satellite tracking program I used back in the day to track space shuttles. DOSBox has versions for Linux, Windows and Mac.

BTW, HomeBank has a bit better printing capabilities than I mentioned above. They've made some improvements that I hadn't noticed, but it's still not their strong point. Simplicity is their strong point, I think, in case anyone else is interested in a checkbook program.

Yeah, when I started this project, She wasn't sure if she used dosbox, or DOSEMU, but when I showed them both to her, she remembered DOSEMU was the one that looked like what she had. Fortunately, she had the backups on the USB thumb drive, so it was a matter of setting up the program and putting everything back in. She was "back in the saddle again" to quote the Firesign Theater. (Do you remember "We're All Bozos on this Bus"?) With all our ramblings, I guess I put this in the correct Forum, eh?

 

[atanere]

Do you remember "We're All Bozos on this Bus"?

No, I don't recall that one, but you are just a tad bit older than me. I think Firesign Theater got eclipsed in my world by Cheech & Chong and George Carlin.

 

[VP9KS]

but you are just a tad bit older than me

Oh, That is cold man! But, Probably true!

 

[atanere]

I've used it with a very old QRZ CD-ROM... the last one that included birth dates

The Shadow knows! I'm such a stalker sometimes! LOL

 

[VP9KS]

Carlin was funny for most of his time on stage, but toward the end his shows were just a long rant about the government. My favorite Carlin theme was Al Sleet, the hippy dippy weatherman! And I really enjoyed Cheech and Chong's "Pedro and the man"