On 1/2/2015 7:36 PM, Mercury Thirteen wrote:
I doubt that you will even see one (1) 32-bit version of FreeDOS.
Whoever is seriously claiming on working on that just doesn't know
what they will get themselves into. MS/PC/DR-/FreeDOS is at its
very core 16bit/x86. You get yourself in one development hell if
you try to change that. And what advantage does a 32bit FreeDOS
supposed to have? What application would you run on it?
I've detailed the advantages in several other emails, and so far as
what applications would run on it... both traditional DOS apps and new
32-bit applications as well.
Well, those "traditional DOS apps", that's the part I seriously doubt.
New 32 bit applications, well, we shall see...
Do you even remotely have an idea on how many function calls (INT21h)
within DOS this is required/expected? Not to mention things like video
both for INT10h or direct write access?
Yes, 114 in interrupt 0x21, not including the others in the 0x2x
series which DOS uses. I'm sure there are some I'm missing, not to
mention the video BIOS routines and such which you mention, so I would
guess around two to three hundred functions total. That's actually not
that many compared to other operating systems - the classic MacOS and
Windows both have literally thousands of function calls and services.
But how to you intend to solve this? How to you interpret a Seg:Ofs
given in a fact into your 32 bit kernel flat space? How you decide which
information to return?
Sorry, but that way is just a "road to nowhere". As you would
loose the
"100% application compatibility" in a heartbeat...
Compatibility would not necessarily be lost, as I've detailed in other
emails as well.
Sorry, I am working with DOS far too long as to see where you "detailed"
anything...
FreeDOS should be and stay just what its original intention is/was,
providing an Open Source clone of the discontinued and closed source 16
bit MS-DOS 6.22.
If anyone wants to improve the odds of getting updated or newer software
for it, IMHO the project needs to be more open to software (tools) that
were written and used at the time DOS was mainstream, even if that means
that software is only "freely" (but legally) available, like the old
Borland compilers. Then I am sure you will be able to get some more
traction again, not by re-using Linux oriented software and tools like
GCC. And even OpenWatcom seems like a dead end now after it seems to
finally have stalled, not only in terms of DOS. Still works though...
Ralf
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