FreeDOS 1.1 Released

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Posted by Unknown on Wednesday January 4, 2012 @05:42AM from the we-don't-need-no-memory-protection dept.

MrSeb writes with this excerpt from an Extreme Tech article about the latest FreeDOS release and a bit of project history: "Some 17 years after its first release in 1994, and more than five years since 1.0, FreeDOS 1.1 is now available to download. The history of FreeDOS stems back to the summer of 1994 when Microsoft announced that MS-DOS as a separate product would no longer be supported. It would live on as part of Windows 95, 98, and (ugh!) Me, but for Jim Hall that wasn't enough, and so public domain (PD) DOS was born. ... Despite what you might think, FreeDOS isn't an 'old' OS; it's actually quite usable. FreeDOS supports FAT32, UDMA for hard drives and DVD drives, and it even has antivirus and BitTorrent clients." The official release announcement has more details on the improvements, and the FreeDOS website has the release for download.

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But what use would I have for it? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-04 05:44 · Score: 3, Insightful

I mean seriously, how am I going to use it?
Running old programs maybe?
1. Re:But what use would I have for it? by Millennium · 2012-01-04 05:48 · Score: 5, Funny
  
  Someone needs to make a CoreBoot-style bootloader that uses this. Then they could call it "DOS Boot".
2. Re:But what use would I have for it? by j-pimp · 2012-01-04 05:51 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  I mean seriously, how am I going to use it?
  Running old programs maybe?
  POS apps. Embedded apps. Yes all legacy stuff, but even in a VM, emulating UDMA and a DVD drive is useful.
  
  --
  --- Justin Dearing http://www.justaprogrammer.net/ We're just programmers.
3. Re:But what use would I have for it? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-04 05:55 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  The same as for Linux. Program, learn, experiment.
4. Re:But what use would I have for it? by ruanime · 2012-01-04 05:58 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  I mean seriously, how am I going to use it?
  Running old programs maybe?
  Yeah I would, maybe one day I can start that BBS that I always wanted.
5. Re:But what use would I have for it? by MightyYar · 2012-01-04 06:00 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  Mostly I've used it for running old games (via DOSBox), but I've encountered it when using BIOS updates and other standalone boot utilities.
  
  --
  W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
6. Re:But what use would I have for it? by TopSpin · 2012-01-04 06:01 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  I actually used it extensively last November to develop an Option ROM BIOS extension. DOS is a convenient long real assembly code testing environment. Compile a COM program with NASM on Linux, use mtools to copy the output to the (live) VirtualBox FAT floppy image and execute in (Free)DOS.
  
  --
  Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
7. Re:But what use would I have for it? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-04 06:06 · Score: 5, Interesting
  
  I asked Dell to sell me a Vostro 200 ST with FreeDos instead of Windows and avoided paying for an OS I wasn't going to use.
8. Re:But what use would I have for it? by TheGratefulNet · 2012-01-04 06:20 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  DIL_
  (system hung...)
  Dammit! I gotta go rebuild dilo again. again!
  
  --
  
  --
  "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
9. Re:But what use would I have for it? by hawguy · 2012-01-04 06:29 · Score: 5, Informative
  
  I mean seriously, how am I going to use it?
  Running old programs maybe?
  I use it for installing BIOS and other hardware driver updates that need a DOS boot disk. The process goes something like this:
  http://www.tummy.com/journals/entries/jafo_20080920_234755
10. Re:But what use would I have for it? by Cro+Magnon · 2012-01-04 06:31 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  I mean seriously, how am I going to use it?
  Running old programs maybe?
  POS apps. Embedded apps. Yes all legacy stuff, but even in a VM, emulating UDMA and a DVD drive is useful.
  But don't most Piece Of Shit apps run under Windows?
  
  --
  Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
11. Re:But what use would I have for it? by toriver · 2012-01-04 07:11 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  Run it in VirtualBox - I had better success running some old DOS games in that combo than in DosBox...
12. Re:But what use would I have for it? by LWATCDR · 2012-01-04 07:31 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Actually yes. I know of people that keep old dos computers around just to run one old program.
  Also Embedded systems. DOS is light and small and does not get into your way. If you have a crash you can almost bet money that the problem is 100 your code.
  Under DOS you can also bit bang hardware interfaces that would be difficult to do with anything else.
  As to uses let me give you an example. Their are some old devices that used 3.5" floppies but with a custom format. There are programs for dos that can read that data. If you have one of those devices then this is exactly what you need.
  And of course to flash bios.
  
  --
  See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
13. Re:But what use would I have for it? by hawguy · 2012-01-04 08:25 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  A) Sounds like you don't care that it's FreeDOS, it was just what you used because the vendor used it.
  It's true that I didn't care that it was FreeDOS, but I didn't use it because the vendor used it, I used it because the vendor gave me an EXE and said "Here, run this in DOS". I don't have easy access to a Windows machine to create a DOS boot disk (I don't even know if it's possible to do that these days?), I used FreeDOS.
  So even if I don't care that it's FreeDOS, I use it because it's Free and it's DOS compatible (thus runs the application I needed it for). Which seems a bit like telling a Mac fanatic "Sounds like you don't care that it's from Apple, you only use it because you like the GUI and applications that run on it."
  
  B) I'd like a better system anyway, for the whole process, but I've been wanting that for 20+ years anyway.
  And yes, I'd like a better system too, I have some newer hardware that has firmware updaters that actually run in Linux.
14. Re:But what use would I have for it? by Grishnakh · 2012-01-04 09:15 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  With Linux, you get to learn about a real OS, which uses things like protected memory, processes, virtual memory, etc. If you come up with something useful, then you can deploy it on Linux systems everywhere or share it with the world so others can use it on their Linux systems.
  With FreeDOS, you're only learning about an obsolete program loader. No one would create a serious application to run in DOS any more, because to do so would be utterly stupid. It's a lot like getting a Commodore=64 to learn about computers; they were fun in their day, but they're so utterly obsolete any more that it's pretty pointless unless you have a lot of time to burn.
15. Re:But what use would I have for it? by MichaelSmith · 2012-01-04 09:21 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  POS apps
  No, I don't think Eclipse runs in DOS.
  
  --
  http://michaelsmith.id.au
I'm now waiting on FreeQEMM by SensitiveMale · 2012-01-04 05:50 · Score: 4, Funny

and FreeDESQview as well.
Re:Writing Viruses for AV by Kenja · 2012-01-04 05:54 · Score: 5, Insightful

Right... because prior to Windows 95 there where no viruses! So there's NO WAY that the old floppy disc you have with your copy of Elder Scrolls could possibly have a virus on it.

This is DOS we're talking about. There has never been a more virus filled OS in history. What kids today think of as viri are just worms and trojans. DOS has REAL virus issues. Self replicating bastards that attach onto other executables.

--

"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Is No One Excited? by eno2001 · 2012-01-04 06:03 · Score: 4, Informative

I remember the early days of Slashdot where this would have everyone talking. It's pretty damn cool. At this point it's prefect for reproducing real old school gaming. DOSBox is great for that too. But look... you're running a real DOS here! No VM needed! Pull out your 486! Get out your 1994 era Pentium 90! Relive the days when computing was actually fun! I installed FreeDOS with GEM (which was the better GUI compared to Windows back in the day until Apple ruined it by suing Digital Research) on a laptop from 1998. That thing is a BEAST now. Seriously, doesn't anyone get excited about this stuff anymore?

--
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
1. Re:Is No One Excited? by bill_mcgonigle · 2012-01-04 06:29 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Anybody who flashes BIOS ought to be excited.
  Real CDROM support means we should be able to have a .288 file that doesn't need to be mounted loopback and modified with mcopy for every different flasher. An big BIOS images aren't a problem anymore.
  One stock boot image that gets written to the ElTorrito sector and then jump to the CDROM drive to continue execution of the startup script.
  Boilerplate FTW.
  
  --
  My God, it's Full of Source!
  OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
2. Re:Is No One Excited? by Pharmboy · 2012-01-04 06:29 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  I am, so that likely brings the total of excited people up to 6, maybe 7. Everyone else is busy marveling over their iPad and iPhone (oooh, round corners....) and other walled gardens. Like you, I miss being able to actually communicate directly to the hardware, from the command line. I miss hand tweaking my config.sys and autoexec.bat files to squeeze out an extra 500 bytes (yea readers, 1/2 of a kb) of lower RAM. Using QEMM and DesqView to quazi-multitask by multiple line BBS on my 486 with 4mb of ram. (3 lines, but I still have plenty of ram left for a prompt to do maintenance while monitoring chat) There was a certain empowerment that came from operating a computer back then. We actually knew exactly how much power the system had, because we easily found ways to saturate it, just to get every ounce of power out of it. Back then, we did things just because we COULD, and we enjoyed learned from crashing and burning stuff.
  I also remember the good old days when the Internet was hard to use. THOSE were the days. No spam, no popups, and if you could find a website, likely it had real information on it because only computer "experts" and universities had servers. The days before the "Browser Wars", when every Congressman didn't know what the Internet was, instead of now where they know what it is, but still have no idea what it is. And who could forget BBSes, Gopher, and Veronica, Archie, and password protected FTP accounts brimming with goodies like Wolfenstein.... :)
  That said, I don't MISS those days, but at 47, I'm glad I got to be a part of those days, and the days before that with CPM, portable computers with 8086s that weighed 50 pounds, original Macs, and even a VIC 20 with no storage device. You can't recreate them, or duplicate them, so those days are gone for good. It's up to us to create new ideas to eventually become "the good old days".
  
  --
  Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
3. Re:Is No One Excited? by Overly+Critical+Guy · 2012-01-04 07:10 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Slashdot today is more of a political geek site, where a specific demographic comes to rant about copyrights, the DMCA, Apple, etc. Probably generates more revenue that way. I remember when programming articles used to make it to the front page.
  
  --
  "Sufferin' succotash."
4. Re:Is No One Excited? by Overly+Critical+Guy · 2012-01-04 07:17 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  Nostalgia is a deceptive mistress. It tends to glorify things that weren't objectively good but carry sentimental feelings. You miss communicating directly with hardware and editing DOS startup files, but the DOS developers who had to support everybody's esoteric PC hardware sure don't. In fact, those days were a step back from the initial push in the 60s and early 70s toward higher-level abstraction that we've only now come back around to but took a detour from during the initial commoditization of low-end PC hardware. But you explained why you liked it--a sense of mastery that mentally justified the time investment.
  
  --
  "Sufferin' succotash."
5. Re:Is No One Excited? by rubycodez · 2012-01-04 07:30 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  so submit a programming article
Screenshot of 1.1 by sootman · 2012-01-04 06:05 · Score: 5, Funny

C:\>_
(Hmm, never noticed how much that looks like a clown smiley.)

--
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
A new OS?! This changes everything! by brillow · 2012-01-04 06:09 · Score: 5, Funny

Does it have an app store?
Invaluable for our lab equipment by blind+biker · 2012-01-04 06:15 · Score: 5, Interesting

In our labs, we have a shit-ton of expensive analytical and other scientific equipment which is controlled by some DOS-based software. We have been installing FreeDOS on replacement computers, and are all deeply grateful for its existence.

--
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Re:Windows ME did not have DOS. by Dwedit · 2012-01-04 06:22 · Score: 4, Informative

Windows ME had DOS just like Windows 98 did, Microsoft just disabled it. You can hack several bytes, and you get DOS back again.
You must be thinking of Windows XP or Windows 2000, which did not have DOS.
(Free)DOS can still be relevant ... by DigitalDreg · 2012-01-04 06:29 · Score: 5, Informative

DOS and FreeDOS are still relevant in some niche areas:
- Turn-key and embedded hardware often use DOS
- Retro-computing: Some of us like dragging out our old hardware to play with it
- Learning to code closer to the metal; DOS gives you enough services to get you going, while giving you a feel for embedded programming
FreeDOS runs on almost everything from an original IBM PC (1981) to a virtual machine under VMWare and VirtualBox. People (hobbyists) are continuing to work on the utilities to keep it refreshed. For example, in the last year there was a new set of TCP/IP programs added, a utility for sharing folders with a VMWare host, and a new web browser based on Dillo.
It's not for everyone, but if you are curious check it out - it's pretty painless to run in a VM. (Or you can drag out your XT or Pentium 90 for the full effect.)
1. Re:(Free)DOS can still be relevant ... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-04 07:25 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  All of these are better served by using a hand rolled linux.
  Not necessarily. I spent most of the last decade working on the Point-of-Sale system for a very large QSR (Quick Service Restaurant, i.e. "Fast Food"), and we had over 100,000 computers in the field, running MS-DOS. I *think* they were all at least 80386-based, but I do know that many of them had as little as 2 MB of RAM.
  I'm not aware of any version of Linux that would allow us to operate in that small a memory footprint.
  BTW, there are still hundreds (probably thousands) of stores still happily running the old, DOS-based system.
2. Re:(Free)DOS can still be relevant ... by dissy · 2012-01-04 14:38 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  "- Turn-key and embedded hardware often use DOS
  All of these are better served by using a hand rolled linux. You can roll a linux kernel, FS and busybox that is smaller and far more capable.
  So wait, you mean my CNC machine, which uses a DOS program to talk to an ISA controller card to run the machine, would be better served on Linux somehow?
  How would you manage that exactly?
  Seriously, I would love to know. I spent a good 4 days researching this very subject. My very first thoughts were "How can I get this to run under Linux?"
  First, Linux won't even run DOS executable. Fail.
  Second, userspace apps such as DosBox can not modify system memory to communicate to ISA cards. Fail.
  Yes, this is a specific DOS program. Of course it shouldn't be expected to work anywhere else.
  But you did say ALL cases would be served better by Linux, so that includes the cases where you need to run a DOS exe that flips bits in memory to talk to hardware, and access to the exe source is not an option.
  When searching for a replacement computer for the failing Pentium 90 that controls the CNC, I spent quite some time attempting to find a way to run this on something more modern, IE something that could be easily and cheaply purchased.
  The best solution I was able to come up with for a modern computer (~2-3 years old now, but a year old at the time), was to run Linux with an ISA-to-USB converter chassis, connected to a virtual box session running FreeDOS.
  No matter how you want to twist that mess around, DOS is still the required component to which everything else there exists to support.
  There would be much less overhead to just put MSDOS directly on the newer machine, but of course that isn't really doable since none of the newer hardware is supported, and legally speaking one can't get a new license for MSDOS, which could cause problems if I was to prepare the same setup for similar machines at work.
  Especially so for work, I have to think about what might happen after I am gone (Be it move to greener pastures, or get hit by the proverbial bus)
  I can't stick them with a pirated MSDOS copy, and would prefer an easy source for replacement pieces.
  FreeDOS is the answer. It does support new hardware, and still runs the old executables.
  It's also worth noting that even for the second item on GPs list:
  
  Retro-computing: Some of us like dragging out our old hardware to play with it
  Not all games work under DosBox. Sure, a whole lot do, and no doubt they would want to add support for those non-working games. But for the games it does not support, you need DOS in some form.
  This also assumes that games are the only "retro" computer use you can think up, as dosbox is not good for much outside of that scope.
  I'll grant that learning to program closer to the metal would be better served elsewhere.
  Linux if using modern* hardware with more than "I just wanna" as a goal, or to teach fundamentals I would go with an 8 bit CPU that one human mind can fully understand all of.
  Personally I would choose the 6502 for that task, but there's nothing wrong with any of the older simple micros.
  * Modern meaning 15 years old or newer
Re:Kid's first OS by Anonymous Coward · 2012-01-04 06:38 · Score: 5, Funny

"I told you, tou're not getting your kitten back until you configure HIMEM.SYS and solve that IRQ conflict with the Gravis UltraSound!"
helps boot stubborn thin clients by rubycodez · 2012-01-04 07:21 · Score: 3, Interesting

I love to make servers and appliances out of thin clients. But some of those thin clients refuse to boot GNU/Linux or BSD from native file system in external device, or in some cases from large (>2GB) partition. But they will boot GRUB in a FREEDOS partition.
FreeDOS + Raspberry Pi by CFBMoo1 · 2012-01-04 07:25 · Score: 3, Interesting

Would make an interesting combination for people who used to have old computers hooked up to TV sets for monitors like I did back in the day. Even though Raspberry Pi is using a few flavors of Linux, having a DOS option like that would be awesome in a retro kind of way.

--
~~ Behold the flying cow with a rail gun! ~~
Re:Windows ME did not have DOS. by drsmithy · 2012-01-04 15:44 · Score: 3, Informative

One of the reasons Windows ME had such stability issues was because they removed DOS from it and replaced it with an emulator. While Windows 95 and 98 were essentially the Windows GUI on top of glorified DOS internals, Windows ME was an attempt to move away from DOS entirely while keeping the GUI. The intention was to ultimately elimiate the legacy DOS internals outright.
As of Windows 3.0, much of the DOS functionality was replaced by Windows (once it loaded). This increased more in 3.1[1], and by the time of Windows 9x/Me, DOS was basically a bootloader and 16-bit compatibility shim, with essentially all "real" OS functionality in Windows. There's bugger all architectural difference between Windows 95 and Windows Me.

But this failed miserably. This failure resulted in their subsequent low-cost home OS, XP Home, to be based on the NT line instead of the DOS/9x line. If ME had been successful, the Windows home line might still have been 9x-based possibly until SP2 or Vista/7, when security started becoming a visibly major issue.
No, it wouldn't. The idea that there was any desire in Microsoft to keep DOS-based Windows alive for longer than absolutely necessary is laughable. Everyone recognised the limitations imposed by the DOS legacy, and no-one wanted to be constrained by them. Most people were amazed Windows Me was released (though the rationale probably was: if you've spent money on an insurance policy, you may as well cash in on it).
After the IBM/Microsoft "divorce", brought on by the unexpected success of Windows 3.0, the plan was for Windows 95 (nee: 4.0) to be the end of the DOS-based Windows line, replaced by NT-based Windows (as a 0.1 update to NT 4.0, eventually realised as a .1 update to Windows 2000 - XP) in the mid-'90s (keeping in mind Windows 95 was a good 12-18 months late, itself requiring an interim release of Windows 3.11 (incorporating some of the Windows 95 development work) to bridge that gap). Windows 98 was filler product released because of delays in the Windows NT development process meant that consumer hardware capabilities (particularly USB and larger hard disks) were outpacing the capabilities of the retail-channel Windows 95. Hence the reason Windows 98 offers little over the last OEM releases (OSR2.5) of Windows 95 (+IE4) and Windows Me (really just a last squeeze of the teat) relatively even less.
_Before_ "divorce", the "original" original plan was for the OS/2 2.x line (developed mostly by IBM, later to become "Warp", then eComStation) to replace DOS-based Windows for consumer computers and the new-from-scratch OS/2 "NT" (developed solely by Microsoft, renamed after the split as Windows NT, for obvious reasons) to become the "professional" grade OS for business computers.