The Command Line - Commodore 128 System Manual

An important part of the opening display is the following two-
character message:
A >
This is the CP/M 3.0 system prompt. The system prompt tells
you that CP/M is ready to read a command entered by you from
your keyboard. The prompt also tells you that drive A is your
default drive. This means that until you tell CP/M to do otherwise,
it looks for program and data files on the disk in drive A. It also
tells you that you are logged in as user 0, simply by the absence
of any user number other than 0.
NOTE: ln CP/M a single disk drive is identified as drive A. This is
equivalent to unit number 8, drive 0 in C128 and C64 modes.
Usually, the maximum number of drives in CP/M 3.0 is four.
Additional drives are identified as drives B, C, etc.

THE COMMAND LINE

CP/M 3.0 performs tasks according to specific commands that
you type at your keyboard. These commands appear on the
screen in what is called a command line. A CP/M 3.0 command
line is composed of a command keyword and an optional
command tail. The command keyword identifies a command
(program) to be executed. The command tail can contain extra
information for the command, such as a filename or parameters.
The following example shows a command line.
A>DIR MYFILE
ln this example, DIR is the command keyword and MYFILE is the
command tail. To send the command line to CP/M 3.0 for
processing, press the RETURN key, as indicated in this book by
As you type characters at the keyboard, they appear on your
screen. The cursor, moves to the right as you type. If you make a
typing error, press either the INST DEL key or CTRL-H to move
the cursor to the left and correct the error. CTRL is the
abbreviation for the CONTROL key. To specify a control
character, hold down the CTRL key and press the appropriate
letter key. (A list of control characters and their uses is given in
Section 13.)
1 1 - 8