SHARE.EXE

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SHARE.EXE is a TSR program that is part of all MS-DOS versions from 3.0 onwards. The program enables specially programmed applications to lock files for read, write or both.

The background to the program is the fact that DOS-based operating systems did not offer any protection against conflicting file accesses; several programs could easily access a file at the same time and also change this file at the same time. This was not a problem at first, as DOS does not support multitasking and therefore usually only one program has control over the system and can therefore write files as the only one. With the advent of TSR programs, the introduction of network support in MS-DOS 3.1 and later also the Windows operating system , which was at least capable of cooperative multitasking , it was now possible for several programs to access the same file at the same time. To solve the problem that this creates, SHARE.EXE was created.

At the end of the MS-DOS era in particular, numerous programs required SHARE.EXE to be loaded and refused to start if SHARE.EXE was not loaded, such as Microsoft Word 6.0, Microsoft Excel 5.0 or Microsoft Access 1.0.

Windows for Workgroups 3.11 implemented the functionality of SHARE.EXE as a 32-bit driver VSHARE.386 and was therefore no longer dependent on SHARE.EXE. Microsoft later released a patch that installed VSHARE.386 on Windows 3.1 as well. Windows 95 and later operating systems of the Windows 9x series also contained a 32-bit driver to prevent simultaneous file access. Since SHARE.EXE was specially tailored to the FAT16 file system and would have had to be laboriously reprogrammed in order to run on the FAT32 partitions supported from Windows 95 OSR2 onwards, SHARE.EXE was removed from the scope of delivery from this version onwards and cannot can be installed later. Under Windows NT -based operating systems, SHARE.EXE is no longer necessary because of the different operating system architecture; For reasons of compatibility, 32-bit versions of the operating system contain a placeholder file under the name SHARE.EXE, but this has no function.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Microsoft Knowledge Base - Q105771: WD6x: SHARE.EXE Questions and Answers
  2. ↑ Microsoft Knowledge Base - Q106499: XL5 Err Msg: "Must Exit Windows and Load SHARE.EXE..."
  3. ↑ Microsoft Knowledge Base - Q95047: ACC1x: Using SHARE.EXE and VSHARE.386 with Microsoft Access
  4. ↑ Microsoft Knowledge Base - Q112025: Updated VSHARE.386 for Windows / Windows for Workgroups
  5. ↑ Microsoft Knowledge Base - Q161619: Share.exe Is Not Supported in Windows 95 OSR2, Windows 98 or Windows Me

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