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comp.os.msdos.programmer FAQ part 2/5
Section - - How can I find out whether a character has been typed, without waiting for one?

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Top Document: comp.os.msdos.programmer FAQ part 2/5
Previous Document: - How can I read a character without echoing it to the screen, and without waiting for the user to press the Enter key?
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Date: 5 Feb 2002 22:03:03 -0400

 In Turbo Pascal, use KeyPressed. Both Microsoft C and Turbo C offer the
 kbhit() function. All of these tell you whether a key has been pressed.
 If no key has been pressed, they return that information to your
 program. If a keystroke is waiting, they tell your program that but
 leave the key in the input buffer.

 You can use the BIOS call, INT 16 AH=01 or 11, to check whether an
 actual keystroke is waiting; or the DOS call, INT 21 AH=0B, to check for
 a keystroke from stdin (subject to redirection). See Ralf Brown's
 interrupt list <Q:02.03> [What and where is Ralf Brown's interrupt
 list?].

User Contributions:

1
Ben in Seattle
⚠
Jun 2, 2026 @ 4:16 pm
Another solution is to use a parallel port loopback plug. It makes the PC think there is a printer attached. The benefit of this is it doesn't require anticipating the problem with ANSI.SYS escape sequences nor does it make you wait half an hour for the "Abort, Retry, Ignore?" prompt, as some versions of DOS do.

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