Re: [Freedos-user] cannot boot installation media

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

To confirm, you're trying to boot the USB installer:

https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/distributions/1.3/official/FD13-FullUSB.zip


 I assume you unzipped this and wrote the image to the USB flash drive
using the right tool, and didn't just use Copy to get the file to the
drive? (I'm asking because that's a common mistake.)

You will definitely need to use Legacy mode to boot FreeDOS. Legacy
provides a BIOS which FreeDOS needs to run.

When you booted, did you have the USB flash drive already plugged into the
computer? Remember that DOS doesn't understand USB per se, so you can't
plug/unplug the USB flash drive after FreeDOS has booted.



On Sat, Apr 27, 2024, 10:29 PM Davi Ramos via Freedos-user <
freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> So, as I said in another message, I have a computer where I wish to
> install FreeDOS. It is a *Compaq Presario 427, Intel Pentium N3700, 4GB
> RAM, SSD 240GB, and a 14" screen.*
>
> Unfortunately, I cannot get it to boot the installation media
> .
> I have tried numerous USB flash drives as well as an SD card. Forcing it to
> boot takes me back to the bios screen after a few seconds. When I change
> the boot mode to "Legacy", than the flash drive simply disappear. To the
> bios, it's like it doesn't exist.
>
> I'm not sure what the etiquette of sending files to a mailing list is, so
> I uploaded the images with all the settings available on my computer's
> bios. Maybe that will help. I've tried a bunch of combinations but nothing
> seems to work. I was capable of booting into antiX Linux, so it is not as
> if the bios won't boot anything.
>
> These are the images of the bios: https://imgur.com/a/pw8xJBS
>
> Thanks!
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Re: [Freedos-user] MSD freedos diagnostic comparative?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Laaca posted about a new system info tool they'd written, described here:

https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/news/2024/03/fetch4fd-system-info-program/




> On Sat, Apr 27, 2024 at 00:43 Karen Lewellen via Freedos-user <
> freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>> simple question.
>> Given freedos does support  things like larger hard drives and so forth,
>> I
>> am wondering if there is a simple tool comparative to msd for DOS among
>> freedos utilities?
>> or, if anyone knows of a simple tool?
>> my goal is not so much diagnostics as a clear indicator of  machine
>> stats,
>> the way msd provides, processor speed, type of video card, number of
>> drives,
>> memory, irq allocations, those sorts of things.
>> the tech behind my new machine has a new job, and was not solid enough in
>> DOS to provide these details..and I have what may be a failing power
>> supply I cannot replace until I know how much power is best.
>> ideas?
>> even a DOS port of Linux tool?
>> Thanks,
>> KarenL
>>
>
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Re: [Freedos-user] shouldn't fdimples add programs to path?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Thu, Apr 25, 2024 at 9:51 AM Davi Ramos via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> I installed a bunch of stuff (all editors) but when I try to run
> them it doesn't seem like they're on the path. Is that the correct
> behavior? Should I manually add the bins to path? If so, how?


Some larger DOS applications from the 1980s and 1990s would offer to
do that for you, but not always. Generally, the tradeoff is that if
you have a bunch of possible paths in your PATH variable, you can
overload it. If every package added a path to the PATH variable, that
could get very long. Also, this could confuse things. For example, I
like to install a few compilers on my FreeDOS system, like IA16 GCC
and OpenWatcom. If I'm developing in IA16 GCC, I set my PATH variable
(and a few other variables) so I can use IA16 GCC. If I'm working in
OpenWatcom, I set my PATH variable (and a few others) so I can use
OpenWatcom. I'm not likely to be developing in both at the same time,
though - and I don't need to compile stuff every time I boot FreeDOS -
so I don't load those values in my PATH by default.

If you need a path added to your PATH, and it didn't get added for
you, you can just edit the FDAUTO.BAT file yourself. You can also type
the PATH command on the command line to experiment before you edit
your FDAUTO file. For example, I have FED (programmer's text editor)
installed on my system but I don't have it in my PATH. FED is
installed in C:\APPS\FED by default, and the program name is FED.EXE.
To add FED to the PATH, I could type this at the command line:

> PATH C:\freedos\bin;C:\apps\fed

That sets a completely new PATH variable that says "look in
C:\freedos\bin first .. then look in C:\apps\fed" when running
programs. So with this PATH set, when I try to run FED.EXE on the
command line, FreeDOS will first try to execute any FED.EXE in the
current directory (because it always looks in the current dir first)
then will try to run C:\freedos\bin\FED.EXE - but FED isn't there, so
it will then try to run C:\apps\fed\FED.EXE (and that will work,
because that's where FED.EXE lives).

If you already have a bunch of things in your PATH variable and you
don't want to retype the whole thing just to add one new entry to your
PATH, you can use the %PATH% variable expansion like this: Let's say
my PATH was already set to C:\freedos\bin;C:\freedos\links .. if I
wanted to add C:\apps\fed to the end of that, I can type this:

> PATH %PATH%;C:\apps\fed

Now the new value of PATH is C:\freedos\bin;C:\freedos\links;C:\apps\fed


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Re: [Freedos-user] How can I make FreeDOS correctly display the "ã" character?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Davi Ramos wrote:
>> > The "ã" is a very common character in Portuguese. It shows up in words
>> > such as "não", "alçapão", and "órgão".
>> >
>> > The system's keyboard and layout are already configured to "br" (for
>> > Brazilian Portuguese) and working perfectly. Other accentuated
>> > characters display just fine. That is the case of "á", "à", "ô".
>> > However, "ã" shows as something else entirely. Image below:
>> > oIh6TW8.png
>> >
>> > How can I get FreeDOS to correctly display those characters?


Vacek Nules wrote:
>
> Hi Davi,
>
> Your codepage is probably set to CP437, which does not contain the
> "ã" character. Change your codepage to CP850 (or CP858 if you also
> need the Euro sign) and try again.


That's what I was going to suggest too. Looks like Brazilian
Portuguese is codepage 850? So I think Davi also needs to enter these
commands to set up the display for 850:

display con=(ega,850,1)
mode con cp prep=((850) C:\freedos\cpi\ega.cpx)


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Re: [Freedos-user] Dial-up emulation?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Tue, Apr 23, 2024, 9:38 PM Brandon Taylor via Freedos-user <
freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> Since FreeDOS doesn't support physical network hardware (even if it's
> emulated in a program like PCem or 86Box), I figure there's no way FreeDOS
> is gonna be able to connect to the Internet, right? Well...
>
> The developers of the 86Box project have recently implemented emulation of
> a Hayes-compatible dial-up modem. So my question is... will FreeDOS support
> the emulated modem?
>


Well, it's not that "FreeDOS" would support the Hayes modern, but that
terminal/dialer software would then be able to. FreeDOS is not like Linux,
which uses a Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) to support the hardware
directly. FreeDOS, like any DOS, does normal DOS things and leaves certain
hardware access (like playing sounds through a sound card, or accessing a
network to browse the web or check email, or dialing out through a modem)
to other software.

So if you had a terminal/dialer program like Procomm or Telix, then yes, I
expect you'd be able to dial out through this emulated Hayes modem from
FreeDOS.

>
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Re: [Freedos-user] Ré : Way or utility in Freedos to have two applications running

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

> Ramon Riera Marès wrote:
> >>
> >> > First of all, thanks to all the Freedos developers and collaborators.  I 
> >> > want to know if there is any way or utility in Freedos to have
> >> >  two applications running, for example an outliner and a text editor, 
> >> > and be able to switch from one to the other without having to
> >> > exit the current application.  Thanks and regards.  Ramon Riera.
>


Paul and Liam both mentioned DESQview, which was a popular
multitasking system on MS-DOS in the 1990s. I haven't tried it with
FreeDOS, so I can't comment how well it works or if it uses MS-DOS
features that aren't in FreeDOS.

I'll add that MS-DOS also had a "task swapping" feature in DOSSHELL
that was pretty neat. That feature showed up in MS-DOS 5 (1991) and I
used it all the time when I was a university student. My typical use
case was swapping between a word processor and a spreadsheet, such as
when I wrote my physics lab reports.

An archive of the Microsoft Knowledgebase article about it is copied here:
https://jeffpar.github.io/kbarchive/kb/071/Q71870/


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Re: [Freedos-user] Ré : Way or utility in Freedos to have two applications running

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Ramon Riera Marès wrote:
>>
>> > First of all, thanks to all the Freedos developers and collaborators.  I 
>> > want to know if there is any way or utility in Freedos to have
>> >  two applications running, for example an outliner and a text editor, and 
>> > be able to switch from one to the other without having to
>> > exit the current application.  Thanks and regards.  Ramon Riera.

Paul Dufresne wrote:
>>
[..]
>> There was a program, DESKVIEW, that was making an OS that was reentrant... 
>> as far as I understand,
>> that was running over a DOS. Making it easy to have more than one program 
>> running at a time.
>> See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DESQview
[..]
>

Ramon Riera Marès wrote:
>
> Thanks Paul.
>
> I asked AI Gemini and he answered me this:
>
> Question:
>
>  Is there any utility in freedos that allows me to run two programs
>  at the same time?
>
> Gemini answers:
>
>  Yes, there are some utilities in FreeDOS that allow you to run two
>  programs at the same time:
>
>  1. TCC:
>
>  It is a command-line shell that allows you to execute multiple commands
>  in a single line.
>
>  You can use TCC to run two programs at the same time using the &
>  command.
>
>  For example, to run the calc program and the notepad program at the
>  same time, you would run the following command:
>
>  calc & notepad
>
>  The & command tells TCC to run the following command in the background.
>


This is describing the Take Command ("TCC") CMD shell drop-in
replacement for Windows systems, not DOS:
https://jpsoft.com/products/tcc.html

The only "TCC" programs for DOS that come to mind are Borland's Turbo
C Compiler and the Tiny C Compiler.


>  2. 4DOS:
>
>  It is a DOS shell that allows you to run multiple programs in a
>  single session.
>
>  You can use 4DOS to run two programs at the same time using the
>  START command.
>
>  For example, to run the calc program and the notepad program at the
>  same time, you would run the following command:
>
>  START calc START notepad
>
>  The START command starts a new program in a separate window.


I was not aware of this feature in 4DOS. In fact, the START command is
not listed in this copy of the 4DOS manual from 1991:

https://bitsavers.org/pdf/jpsoftware/4DOS_Reference_Manual.pdf

The command reference in the back of the manual goes from "SHIFT" (p.
285) to "SWAPPING" (p. 286). In the Index at the end of the manual, it
goes from "Standard output device" (p. 349) to "Startup options" (p.
350) to "StdColors directive (p. 350). So a "START" command isn't
listed anywhere.

4DOS has a "4START" but that is the name of a batch file
("4START.BTM") that runs whenever you start 4DOS, to set the
environment, colors, etc. But that's not the same as the "START"
command listed here.


Also: the way the "START" sample command line is organized, there is
nothing to suggest to the shell where the two commands should be
divided .. or should it run the command "calc" with the possibly valid
options (such as filenames) of "START" and "notepad"?

Also Also: "..in a separate window" should suggest that this is not
referring to a DOS environment, which doesn't run programs in
"windows."


>  3. W4DOS:
>
>  It is a graphical desktop environment for FreeDOS.
>
>  You can use W4DOS to run two programs at the same time by opening
>  two different windows.
>
>  To open a new window, click the "Start" button and then select "Run."
>
>  In the "Run" dialog box, type the name of the program you want to run,
>  and then click "OK."


"W4DOS" isn't familiar to me, and I wasn't able to find any graphical
desktop environment for DOS called "W4DOS." I don't think this one
exists either.


[..]
> --
>
> Does anyone have experience with these utilities?  Which is the
> simplest?
>


I think you have experienced what is known as "AI Hallucination" where
the AI just makes stuff up. I'm afraid that is a problem with
generative AI. I find that generative AI is usually "ok" to "pretty
good" with summarizing current topics, but generally very poor in
describing things that are edge cases like FreeDOS or FORTRAN. (I
experimented with Bard before it was renamed "Gemini," and did
substantial testing with ChatGPT.)


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Re: [Freedos-user] How to try FDT2404 (Latest test version) on QEMU

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Jim Hall wrote:
[..]
>  > Then I create a virtual disk where I can install FreeDOS T2404. I'll
>  > set this up as 500MB, which is plenty big for what I do:
>  >
>  > $ qemu-img create -f qcow2 2404.qcow2 500M

Paul Dufresne wrote:
> I was prefering raw, because I was using:
> https://www.seei.biz/how-to-mount-raw-images-img-images-on-linux/
> to mount raw disk, and exchange data between the host and the emulated 
> machine.
>
> But I discovered qemu-nbd... that allows the same with qcow2 image too.
> So I guess I will adopt qcow2.


I use qcow2 because it's a bit more efficient, and a little faster.
(Not that speed matters much here .. my 3-yr old desktop PC is still
*way* more powerful than a 1990s '486 or Pentium PC.)

I use guestfstools to "mount" the virtual disk from Linux. Works
great. It's basically this:

guestmount -a "$img" -m /dev/sda1 "$mnt"

In other words:

mkdir /tmp/freedos
guestmount -a mystuff.qcow2 -m /dev/sda1 /tmp/freedos

..and that will "mount" the first (only) partition in my virtual disk,
and make it accessible at /tmp/freedos.

> Now, as I understand, the size of the file for qcow2, is way less than the 
> size specified...
> because allocation is done only when needed... so I would suggest to oversize 
> the value...
> maybe 3G?

That's a lot. FreeDOS (like any DOS) is not big. What are you putting
in that virtual disk? My "C:" virtual disk is 500MB, and that's much
larger than I need to install OpenWatcom plus editors and tools. My
"D:" virtual disk is like 200MB.


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] How to try FDT2404 (Latest test version) on QEMU

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

I run FreeDOS in QEMU on Linux, so I can show you what I do.

First, I unzip the LiveCD ISO image so I can use it:

$ unzip FDT2404-LiveCD.zip '*.iso'
Archive:  FDT2404-LiveCD.zip
  inflating: T2404LIVE.iso


Then I create a virtual disk where I can install FreeDOS T2404. I'll
set this up as 500MB, which is plenty big for what I do:

$ qemu-img create -f qcow2 2404.qcow2 500M
Formatting '2404.qcow2', fmt=qcow2 cluster_size=65536 extended_l2=off
compression_type=zlib size=524288000 lazy_refcounts=off
refcount_bits=16


And then I boot the FreeDOS 1.3 LiveCD using QEMU. To install, I don't
need much, so I set up FreeDOS to use 32MB memory. I use -enable-kvm
with QEMU 8.1.3 on Fedora Linux 39.

$ qemu-system-i386 -enable-kvm -m 32 -cdrom T2404LIVE.iso -hda
2404.qcow2 -boot order=d


That gets me into the installer, which will always boot from the
LiveCD because I used order=d. Install FreeDOS as you would normally.

After I install, I use a slightly different command line to boot
FreeDOS. This gives me two things: 1. I have a separate hard disk
image with all my personal stuff, and 2. I add SB16 and AdLib support
so I can play games. This is the script I use to run FreeDOS: (quoted
with ">")


> #!/bin/bash
> # wrapper to run FreeDOS in a QEMU virtual machine
>
> # to create an empty disk image, do this:
> # qemu-img create -f qcow2 freedos.qcow2 500M
>
> # '-display' options can be 'sdl' or 'gtk' or 'curses'
> # '-soundhw pcspk' is no longer supported
>
> qemu-system-i386 -enable-kvm -m 32 -boot menu=on -device sb16 -device adlib \
> -hda /usr/local/tmp/freedos/2404/2404.qcow2 \
> -hdb $HOME/lib/freedos/mystuff.qcow2 \
> -cdrom /usr/local/tmp/freedos/2404/T2404BNS.iso "$@"



A note on the paths: I keep my FreeDOS install (my virtual C: drive)
in /usr/local/tmp because I don't need to back it up. If it's outside
my home directory, I don't bother backing it up when I backup my
computer. (I can just download it again and re-install it.) But I have
my personal stuff under my home directory (in $HOME/lib/freedos) so
that gets backed up.

Also: this shows that I have the BonusCD loaded on the virtual system.
After I install, the first thing I do is switch to the BonusCD so I
can install the compilers and editors I use.


On Thu, Apr 4, 2024 at 11:01 PM Paul Dufresne via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Hi! Especially to Lunduke fans having their "second part" of DOS week... 
> about one year and a half after first part.
> So from April 3 to April 10 2024.
> I am not a paid subscriber to lunduke.locals.com and just observing it from 
> far.
>
> I decided to retry FreeDOS after not using it for too many months.
>
> And as I do in this time... I search back the messages I have previously left 
> on the list to help me know how to launch qemu...
> as I don't think the wiki have an article about it...
> But it has been a long time... and I am seeding a new message for the next 
> time(s).
>
> So FDT2404 is out: "
> ###
> FreeDOS 2404-Test ("FreeDOS T2404")
> ###
>
> Warning: This is a FreeDOS development build and is for testing purposes.
> It may exhibit behavior vary different from a release build and may not be
> suitable for regular use. For general use, please consider using the latest
> release build available at http://freedos.org
> "
>
> And can be found at:
> https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/distributions/test/readme.txt
>
> This time, I  have chosen to use 
> https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/distributions/test/FDT2404-FullUSB.zip
> rather than the usual 
> https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/distributions/test/FDT2404-LiveCD.zip
> Mostly, I find a disk image, a more simple and logical format that a CDROM or 
> DVD image format (iso file).
>
> So with an iso file I would use -cdrom image.iso... but the FullUSB.zip 
> contains an .img file, that I will use the same
> qemu parameter as the hard drive destination image: -drive 
> format=raw,file=$DISK where DISK=T2404FULL.img
>
> Steps goes about like this:
> Download and extract 
> https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/distributions/test/FDT2404-FullUSB.zip
>  in FDT2404 directory.
> cd FDT2404
> qemu-img create fdos.img 1000M
> DESTDISK=fdos.img
> INSTALLDISK=FDT2404FULL.img
>
> At install time, I present first INSTALLDISK, then DESTDISK:
> qemu-system-i386 -cpu 486 -name FreeDOS -machine pc-i440fx-4.2 -m 64 -drive 
> format=raw,file=$INSTALLDISK -drive format=raw,file=$DESTDISK -audiodev 
> pa,id=mysnd -device sb16,audiodev=mysnd -device adlib,audiodev=mysnd -machine 
> pcspk-audiodev=mysnd -vga cirrus -display sdl -net nic,model=pcnet -net user
>
> After installation, I present first DESTDISK containing the installed 
> FreeDOS, and then INSTALLDISK (not so much needed anymore):
> qemu-system-i386 -cpu 486 -name FreeDOS -machine 

Re: [Freedos-user] Coding in BASIC for Freedos?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Sun, Mar 17, 2024 at 12:52 PM Thomas Cornelius Desi  wrote:
>
> Hi Jim,
>
> Question to you: Do you know how many LINES the FREEDOS Kernel has?
>
> Thanks, Thomas
>


Doing a quick count of _everything_ in the source tree, including
tools and tests, from  version 2.43 in Jeremy's GitHub
(https://github.com/FDOS/kernel/releases/tag/ke2043) I found this
count:

All *.asm and *.inc files: 14,019 lines
(these are Assembly files)

All *.c and *.h files: 29,510 lines
(these are C language files)


That also includes blank lines, though.


(FYI: the correct capitalization is FreeDOS, not FREEDOS .. because
"DOS" stands for "Disk Operating System" and FreeDOS is the free /
open source version of DOS.)


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Re: [Freedos-user] Why DOS?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Sun, Mar 17, 2024 at 12:28 PM Alvah Whealton via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> This question has arisen several times.  I choose DOS because going back to 
> the Commodore 64 is so impractical for me.
>

I used DOS when I was growing up. My first computer was an Apple II at
school, and then my family bought an Apple II+ clone for home. But
when the IBM PC came out, my family bought one (although I think my
first might have been an XT, not the PC 5150).

Even in the early days of DOS, I realized DOS was more powerful than
the Apple II. Once I figured out that the BASIC programming
environment was essentially the same as the Apple II (except graphics
were quite different) I made the switch. I was sad that I couldn't
move over my old BASIC programs from the Apple II, but I still had fun
writing new BASIC programs on DOS.

And the cool thing about DOS was that it was so simple that even I
could figure it out: the kernel boots, then it reads config.sys for
settings. Then it runs command.com as the first program (the "shell")
and command.com runs autoexec.bat to set up the environment. I was 10
or 11 when we got the PC, and it was simple enough that I could figure
out how it worked. That's pretty cool for someone who was still
learning about computers.

Later, MS-DOS 5 was a huge step up. The earlier DOS versions were
fine, but MS-DOS 5 changed so much. The file manager (DOSSHELL) and
the BASIC environment (QBASIC) and the new text editor (EDIT, a
stripped down QBASIC without the "BASIC" stuff) were outstanding.
Things felt more powerful. I could do a lot more in DOS, and I enjoyed
doing it.

I also loved the DOS programs and games. I liked writing my own games,
mostly math puzzles and turn-based adventure games. But the word
processor we had was very nice. And in high school, I learned about
Lotus 1-2-3 .. and I relied on that for my physics lab analysis when I
went to university. That's also when I discovered the "shareware"
concept, where you could find these excellent programs that did
everything I needed but at a fraction of the price of the commercial
software. I switched from the student edition of WordPerfect to Galaxy
Write, and from Lotus 1-2-3 to AsEasyAs. And I picked up a bunch of
other shareware that helped me.

I learned FORTRAN77 programming on the VAX at university, but my
brother (a computer science major at another university) introduced me
to C programming, and gave me his old copy of Microsoft QuickC (I
think he was using TurboC by then) so I could write my own programs on
DOS. I wrote little programs that enhanced my DOS command line - which
were pretty simple tools with my "beginner" knowledge .. like my own
TYPE that had command line options to convert to uppercase/lowercase
and do other things. But they were useful to me, and I made them, and
that made them special.

When I learned about LaTeX for writing scientific papers (like physics
lab reports) I found emTeX on DOS, and used that. I also wrote some
tools that would simplify converting my papers into LaTeX format, or
convert my LaTeX files to nroff (which I discovered in the campus Unix
lab).


So I guess I've always been fascinated by DOS, back to an early age.
And I find that, despite all the changes in modern computing, some
things haven't really gotten much better (or only incrementally
better) since DOS. My favorite spreadsheet program (on any system) in
2024 is still AsEasyAs on DOS. If I didn't need to share spreadsheets
with other people, I think AsEasyAs could meet almost all of my
spreadsheet needs today - it just does some things differently, like
conditional formatting (because of the limited text color palette).
The keyboard navigation and "/" menus in AsEasyAs are a "plus" for me
because my finger memory is still there. :-)

I love FreeDOS in 2024 because it's a cool DOS system that has tools
that MS-DOS didn't have. The "What's included" report for FreeDOS 1.3
lists everything, but I especially like the Unix-like tools ("GNUish")
and the compilers like IA-16 GCC and OpenWatcom C. I have a legit copy
of Turbo C/C++ that works fine on FreeDOS, but I still love writing
programs with FED (simple, but with things like code highlighting and
editable keybindings) and compiling on the command line. I even use
EDLIN sometimes when I just need to write something quick. (I even
compiled Gregory's FreeDOS Edlin on Linux .. and I'll use it there
instead of ed(1) sometimes, just for the retro feel.)

And I love that folks are still writing new stuff that keeps DOS going
in 2024. Jerome releases a new Test Release every month, and I always
install that right away. Even though I run FreeDOS in a virtual
machine, you have SBEMU or VSBHDA to emulate SB16 if you run FreeDOS
on real hardware. Japheth's JEMM works well. lDebug and Debug/X are
great extensions to the original DEBUG. The mTCP tools do cool things.
Willi's FDHELP documentation is a great reference for new users.
There's so much there!

Re: [Freedos-user] Coding in BASIC for Freedos?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Sun, Mar 17, 2024 at 6:26 AM Liam Proven via Freedos-user
 wrote:
[..]
> There are good reasons that DOS went away some 35 years ago. It has
> its uses but not being able to flip to another window or another
> screen to consult documentation, or try something out, or look it up
> online, is a *massive* handicap.
[..]
> If you have a Raspberry Pi, the core of RISC OS is 6MB of code. That's
> the kernel, the GUI, the desktop, the text editor, image viewer,
> BASIC, and so on. It's a multitasking internet-capable GUI OS with one
> of the best and fastest BASICs ever.

That's a very interesting way of "advocating" FreeDOS, and "helping"
folks who are new to FreeDOS.

Here we have a person who discovered FreeDOS, who wants to experiment
with FreeDOS by writing programs with it, and was looking for pointers
to get started. It's a very odd reaction to immediately tell that
person to go find another operating system. That's not very welcoming.

If someone discovers FreeDOS and wants to explore FreeDOS, we should
help them find a way to "Yes" and not to "No."


[..]
> I like DOS. I use DOS. But I am also realistic about DOS. If you want
> to learn, today, almost anything else is better.
>

We all know that FreeDOS is DOS, and that means it is an operating
system built on 1980s and 1990s limitations. But FreeDOS is a cool
retro system with more updated tools, so it's great for learning.
FreeDOS (like any DOS) has very few "moving parts," you can see how it
starts up and what it's doing: 1. kernel 2. config.sys 3. command.com
4. autoexec.bat. And if something goes really wrong (like you did
something weird in a new program you wrote, and it crashes and locks
up the system) you just reboot.


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Re: [Freedos-user] Report back: QEMU - Max size of Linux access folder

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Sat, Mar 16, 2024, 3:27 AM hms--- via Freedos-user <
freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> Correction. My apologies. My memory doesn't work all that well these days.
> Re. Linux error on boot up. I incorrectly said deleting the files in the
> /dev/crash directory fixed the problem.
> The correct directory is /var/crash
>

That makes more sense. Nothing should be writing logs to the /dev
directory. But writing to /var is more typical. Although I would have
expected /var/log/crash … but I don't know Ubuntu systems very well.

>
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Re: [Freedos-user] Coding in BASIC for Freedos?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Fri, Mar 15, 2024 at 4:08 PM Norby Droid via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>>
>> DOes anyone have any experience with AUdioPCI cards onFreeDOS?
>[..]

Please start a new thread for this question. It is unlikely to be seen
in a discussion thread about how to get started with programming on
FreeDOS.


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Re: [Freedos-user] Coding in BASIC for Freedos?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Fri, Mar 15, 2024 at 5:23 PM tsiegel--- via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>[..]
> If you want something a bit more powerful, but not as complex as C, you
> can always use turbo pascal, there are multiple versions of turbo pascal
> in the museum site Borland setup before being sold to who know who, and
> last time I checked, (about a year and a half ago), that site was still
> active.
>
> That site also has versions of turbo c, though I'm pretty sure it's not
> the latest version of turbo c for dos, but that's not really a problem,
> because there are other C compiles for dos that are free if the turbo c
> doesn't meet your needs.
>[..]


The website you're thinking of is Embarcadero. They bought the "IP"
(rights) to Borland's products years ago, and they make them available
via their "archive" website. We link to Borland TurboC, TurboC++, and
TurboPascal from this page on the FreeDOS website:
https://www.freedos.org/about/devel/

The programs are free to download, but you need to register an account
with them. I created an account for myself and I downloaded TurboC and
TurboC++ (they run great under FreeDOS) but I found their archive
website to be very slow and had weird navigation. But I did manage to
download them.


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] Coding in BASIC for Freedos?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Fri, Mar 15, 2024 at 11:45 AM Thomas Cornelius Desi via
Freedos-user  wrote:
>
> Hello,
>
> could someone from the list give me an advice, what programming language to 
> learn,
> if I would want to do some programming in FREEDOS?
>
> I am an absolute »Noobie« with programming, but stumbling about some source 
> files,
> especially BASIC, which I would work with.
>
> My aim is to do some alterations to existing source (sort-of-text editor).
>
> What would your advice be?
>


Great to hear you want to create programs in FreeDOS!

We list some resources on our website that you might be interested in:
https://www.freedos.org/about/devel/

Our preferred C compiler for FreeDOS programs is OpenWatcom C, and our
preferred assembler is NASM. But if you are just getting started, you
might start with something like BASIC or Pascal. We include many of
these tools in FreeDOS. Here's a list of everything that's available
in FreeDOS 1.3 (look at 'devel'):
https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/distributions/1.3/official/report.html

The 'fbc' package is the FreeBASIC Compiler, and 'fpc' is the
FreePascal Compiler.

If you want to explore other programming languages, we have a "teach
yourself" guide to learn C programming here:
https://www.freedos.org/books/cprogramming/

That "ebook" also has links to YouTube videos if you prefer tutorial
videos. You can also find other "programming how-to" videos in the
"FreeDOS Programming" playlist on the FreeDOS YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/@freedosproject/playlists

To learn about C programming, I recommend using a C compiler we
provide in the FreeDOS distribution. I really like IA-16 GCC and
OpenWatcom C.


Writing a text editor as a first project when learning programming may
be a tough job. But you suggested you want to make changes to an
existing editor, so that may involve less work. To learn a new
programming language, I recommend starting with small programs and
work your way up. The C programming guide (above) walks you through
how to write your own simple versions of several FreeDOS commands ..
and by the end of the book you learn how to write your own turn-based
board game using the conio library in C.


I hope that helps you to get started!


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] QEMU - Max size of Linux access folder

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Jim Hall wrote:
[..]
> > If there's a config issue on your Lubuntu, you might
> > consider updating to 23.10 or 24.04 LTS

Liam Proven wrote:
> Whoah. Not correct. Not possible.
>
> LTS releases can be upgraded directly to the next LTS release (and
> nothing else.)
>
> Interim releases only to the next interim release. If that is then an
> LTS, then you can go LTS->LTS.
>
> So, the only choices for 18.04 are to 18.10 (now long dead) or to 20.04.
>
> Then, from 20.04 the OP could go to 22.04... and for now, that's it.
> 24.04 isn't out yet.

Well, whatever the process is to move from "old Lubuntu" to "new Lubuntu."

I run Fedora and whenever the new version comes out, I backup my data,
nuke and reinstall. But then again, I tend to install packages here
and there to experiment with over time - I'm not interested in
carrying forward some tool or program I installed 4 months ago and
used for a week. So completely reinstalling works well for me (even
though they have an "upgrade" process).


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Re: [Freedos-user] QEMU - Max size of Linux access folder

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Mon, Mar 11, 2024 at 3:34 AM h...@iafrica.com  wrote:
>
> Hi Jim
> Thank you. I have few questions. What is the maximum size allowed for
> the FreeDos image file? Can I resize my image file, currently 200Mb? Can
> I create an additional virtual drive "D:" and mount it in the same way?

I wouldn't approach this as "what's the biggest disk I can use" but
"how much disk do I need?"

DOS is pretty small. It's really only the things you add on to it
(applications and data) that takes up large amounts of space. My C:
drive is 500MB, and that's pretty big. My D: drive (where I store all
my data and source files) is 220MB. I have mine set up that way
because I start over with a new C: drive every time we have a new
monthly test release, but all my stuff stays safe on the D: drive.
(When I install the new test release, I don't boot QEMU with the D:
drive image.)

My D: used to be 100MB, but then I added a lot of games and stuff to
it. There wasn't any point in going through gymnastics to resize D:
dynamically .. I just made a new 220MB D: drive, partitioned &
formatted it, mounted both under Linux (guestfsfools) then copied
everything over. That takes very little time to do, but trying to find
a way to resize the D: disk image and extending the filesystem on it
to fill the new size would have taken more steps - and I'm a lazy guy,
so I took the easy route. Making a new drive image, partitioning &
formatting it, and copying files took a few minutes.

> Re. Use of "sudo" When I tried to run QEMU with with the "-enable-kvm"
> option, I received an error message of permission denied. I have since
> tried without "sudo" and it now works? My Linux installation (Lubuntu
> 18.04) has also sustained damage since playing with QEMU. I receive an
> error message window on the desktop after boot-up which simply says "
> System Error" and provides two buttons of "Report" and "Cancel". No
> other info. I'm guessing there is a log entry hiding somewhere?

I don't know how or why QEMU would have caused any damage to the Linux
operating system, even when running it as root (sudo). QEMU is
providing a virtual machine environment to the guest operating system
.. and that shouldn't cause a problem in the host operating system.
Since the error comes up "on the desktop" (when you login) I suspect
the "system error" you're seeing is an unrelated user profile issue.
Unfortunately, I don't run Lubuntu (I run Fedora) so I'm not confident
I can help you track down the error. My first suggestion would be to
create a "dummy" account on Lubuntu and login to that. If you don't
see the error when you login there, then the "system error" is
something going on with your account .. probably a user profile issue
in LXDE (Wikipedia says Lubuntu 18.04 LTS uses LXDE).

For what it's worth: Lubuntu 18.04 LTS is quite old. I understand the
release "number" is actually a date, so 18.04 was released in April
2018. Wikipedia says this was supported for 3 years, and support ended
in late April 2021. The current Lubuntu is 23.10 (released October
2023) and the next release is supposed to be 24.04 LTS (planned for
late April 2024). If there's a config issue on your Lubuntu, you might
consider updating to 23.10 or 24.04 LTS, which will give you a fresh
start anyway - and get you up to date.


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Re: [Freedos-user] QEMU - Max size of Linux access folder

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

I wrote the article, but I haven't used this QEMU feature for a long
time. I found that the "live" access to the folder could be
problematic (sometimes no problem .. typically slow .. crashed QEMU a
few times) but that was several years ago and the QEMU folks may have
fixed that issue by now.

Now, I use a virtual disk image for QEMU. After I shut down the
FreeDOS guest, I can "mount" the virtual disk as a non-privileged
Linux user with guestfstools, and manage files like I normally would.
If the image file is "$img" and the mount point is "$mnt" (such as
/tmp/freedos) then run this:

guestmount -a $img -m /dev/sda1 $mnt

And when you're done, you can unmount it with this:

guestunmount $mnt


Also: You don't have to run QEMU as root (with sudo). I never do.

Jim


On Sun, Mar 10, 2024 at 12:53 PM hms--- via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Hi there
> I need some help please. Does any one know how to get around the size
> limitation of the access Linux folder when running FreeDos under QEMU?
> The access folder is named "dosfiles" as in Jim Hall's article on
> Opensource.
> Running the command:-
> sudo qemu-system-i386 -m 32 -rtc base=localtime -drive
> file=dos.img,index=0,media=disk,format=raw -drive
> file=fat:rw:dosfiles/,format=raw -boot order=c -display  sdl -enable-kvm
>
> Gives status message of:-
> vvfat dosfiles/ chs 1024,16,63
>
> And an error message is issued:-
> qemu-system-i386: -drive file=fat:rw:dosfiles/,format=raw: Directory
> does not fit in FAT16 (capacity 516.06 MB)
>
> Removing files from the "dosfiles" directory allows FreeDos to run.


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Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS webpage - where can I see more News?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

I will need to add a link or button to show more news. Right now, it
just shows the latest six news items.

The FreeDOS news items are actually stored in the SourceForge News
system, and the website pulls from the RSS feed to generate the news
items for the front page. Here's the link to our news items on SF:
https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/news/



On Sun, Mar 10, 2024 at 4:55 PM Ladislav Lacina via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> After last changes of the FreeDOS webpage I don't know how to display more 
> "What's new" on the webpage.
> In the previous designs there was a link like "Older news" but now I do not 
> see it more.
> I was looking the announcement for the Dosfetch utility but because of this 
> issue I was not able to find it.
> ___
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> Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user


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[Freedos-user] C programming guides

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Starting a new thread for this topic:

On Wed, Feb 28, 2024 at 7:46 AM Linvel Risner via Freedos-user
 wrote:
[..]
> I'm trying to research written programming guides, although maybe I
> should just watch the Jim Hall video sets.
>


I also wrote a series of articles to support the videos, which might
interest you:

https://www.freedos.org/books/cprogramming/

I've been planning to migrate the FreeDOS Wiki to new hosting for a
long time, and Goal #2 after that is to move the "FreeDOS Books"
content (including 'Writing FreeDOS Programs in C') into the wiki. So
eventually, the programming series will be in the wiki.

I also worked with folks to edit the C programming articles into a
"version 2.0" for a printed book, which was available on Lulu.com for
a while. Let me know if you are interested in that and I'll see if I
can reactivate the item on Lulu.


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] Announcement: lDebug release 7

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Excellent news, thanks for sharing! I'll post a news item about it for the
website this tomorrow, when I'm in front of my computer again

On Fri, Feb 16, 2024, 1:23 PM E. C. Masloch via Freedos-user <
freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> Hello list!
>
> Today I prepared release 7 of lDebug (small L). lDebug is an advanced
> debugger for 86-DOS like systems. It is based on Paul Vojta's and
> Japheth's FreeDOS Debug/X, which in turn started out as a clone of
> MS-DOS Debug. Like all of these, it operates with a line-based terminal
> interface. lDebug expands a lot on the capabilities of its ancestors
> however.
>
> Release 7 adds one big feature that's new: The debugger now allocates
> space for and allows loading of Extensions for lDebug (ELDs). Several
> dozen ELDs have been written so far. They're included in the release in
> the bin/ subdirectory (lDebug original packages) or in BIN/ (FreeDOS
> package). The ELD architecture was created to allow optional extensions
> of the debugger without bogging down the build, particularly the code
> segment, with a lot of most likely unused code.
>
> Other than that, some bugfixes have arrived. To summarize from the
> manual's list of news [1]:
>
>   * The DIL command works now, fixing an embarrassing bug in release 6
> for which I provided patches [2].
>   * The INSTALL command correctly works with the AREAS keyword followed
> by another keyword.
>   * Two bootloaded mode file system read errors were fixed, one when a
> file ends exactly on a cluster boundary and another when a FAT12 entry
> is read which straddles a sector boundary in the FAT.
>   * The BOOT PROTOCOL= command with two kernel load files (MS-DOS v6 or
> IBM-DOS load protocol) now allows to freely select the second (DOS) file
> in any subdirectory of the partition to boot from.
>
> A few new features were added (aside from those implemented by
> Extensions for lDebug):
>
>   * An INSTALL TOGGLE command to switch certain features on or off.
>   * A fractional digit sometimes displayed for formatted sizes.
>   * ::scripts:: and ::config:: keywords can be used in pathnames passed
> to Y, EXT, or BOOT DIR commands in bootloaded mode.
>   * The debugger will allocate a 2 KiB environment block for itself (in
> any mode) which is intended for storing Variables for lDebug using the
> set.eld and variable.eld.
>   * The application and device init will try to work with a smaller
> initial allocation instead of enforcing a maximum-size ("init max")
> layout early on.
>
> Several new switches are now recognised by the application and device
> mode init. /X resizes the ELD code instance segment from its default
> size, /Y does likewise for the ELD data block area, and /H is the switch
> to do the same to the debugger's history buffer. There is also the
> undocumented /T switch, described some on the blog [3].
>
> Some little-used features of the debugger were actually thrown out. The
> build options _EMS, _RM, and _RN are now disabled by default. They
> correspond to the X commands, as well as the RM and RN command. If
> desired, then apart from creating a build with the options enabled,
> users may instead choose to install the Extensions for lDebug that share
> the sources of the disabled commands. They are named x.eld, rm.eld, and
> rn.eld. They can be used either as transient ELDs (to run a single
> command; requires DOS or bootloaded FS access each time) or installed as
> resident ELDs (needs to access the file only for ELD install).
>
> The packages of this release are found on our server [4]. In the fdpkg
> subdirectory I placed a FreeDOS package, and in the svardpkg a SvarDOS
> binary and sources package each. As usual, all changes are recorded in
> the hg (Mercurial) repository, which can be browsed using our hgweb [5].
>
> As a news blurb for the FreeDOS website (and the sourceforge.net news
> tracker [6]) I would suggest the following:
>
> lDebug release 7
>
> lDebug (small L) is a DOS debugger based on FreeDOS Debug/X. Today's new
> release 7 adds the architecture for Extensions for lDebug, with 52
> different ELDs included in the release package. Further, a number of
> smaller improvements and fixes are included, several of which make
> lDebug better in its bootloaded mode. The application and device mode
> init is less memory-hungry than it would be with its prior "init max"
> approach. Find more details on [the mailing list], and everything lDebug
> at [the lDebug website][7].
>
> Regards,
> ecm
>
>
> [1]: https://pushbx.org/ecm/doc/ldebug.htm#news-r7
> [2]:
>
> https://pushbx.org/ecm/dokuwiki/blog/pushbx/2023/0911_live_patching_the_debugger_itself
> [3]:
>
> https://pushbx.org/ecm/dokuwiki/blog/pushbx/2023/0911_debugger_relocation_all_switches_explained
> [4]: https://pushbx.org/ecm/download/ldebug/
> [5]: https://hg.pushbx.org/ecm/ldebug/log/release7
> [6]: https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/news/
> [7]: https://pushbx.org/ecm/web/#projects-ldebug
>
>
> 

Re: [Freedos-user] One use case for FreeDos

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Thomas Cornelius Desi wrote:
>
> Apropos authoring on DOS Software: As I was looking for
> someting nifty that would enhance my writing workflow on
> the computer, I decided for VDE by Eric Meyer writer.
> ( have a look here: https://archive.org/details/vde-197 )
> It actually does sort-of-UTF8 encoding which in my case
> (German Umlaute äöü ß) is important.  And yes: why has
> it become so cumbersome to switch of internet-connections?!

It's a different sort of thing, but a colleague shared his editor's
advice to write in a way that makes it difficult to go back and edit
what you've done, while you're writing it. The idea is that you don't
spend time "editing as you go" - constantly spinning your wheels,
editing what you just wrote when you should be focusing on writing new
stuff - and instead do all your editing and revisions after you've
finished a full draft of something (article, chapter, etc).

I tried his advice, and I have been (unironically) writing articles
using Edlin or ed(1) at home. (That's why I had the "comma" question
last week.) I write my content in plain text using Markdown, which
makes it easy to do simple formatting like section headings, bold, and
italics. When I'm done with my draft, I run the Markdown command to
convert to HTML, open it in a browser and copy/paste into a word
processor - where I'll finish editing before I submit. It works well
for what I do. And it's the ultimate in "distraction free" writing.
:-)


> and let’s mention »Captain Blackbeard« editor. Also great!
>

That's an editor I hadn't heard of (there were a million text editors
in the DOS era) so I looked it up:
http://www.edm2.com/index.php/Captain_Blackbeard

Very interesting programmer's editor.


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Re: [Freedos-user] One use case for FreeDos

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Mart Zirnask wrote:
>> As for writers with DOS, I recalled and managed to dig up a video with
>> Philip Roth using a standing desk and a Blue DOS Screen - is this also
>> Wordstar? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBlVEcMSOGw=201
>>
>> The video is dated 2004, though - back then, I imagine it was not that
>> uncommon yet to use a DOS wordprcessor.

Louis Santillan wrote:
>
> That looks like Wordperfect for DOS.

Agreed, that's definitely WordPerfect for DOS at 3:30 in the video.
And a few seconds earlier at 3:25, you can see the WordPerfect
template over the Model M function keys.


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Re: [Freedos-user] One use case for FreeDos

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

> Dan Schmidt wrote:
> > Now, I might have gone with WordPerfect 6 instead of
> > WordStar 4, but the idea itself is solid: A computer that
> > you just use for writing, sans distractions. No YouTube,
> > no Email, no Facebook -- you sit -- you write.  I mean,
> > it's hard to argue it didn't work well for this guy!


Anton Shepelev wrote:
> No ChatGPT assistant/coauthor.


"Doesn't have ChatGPT or a co-author tool" is actually not a problem
for a professional writer. It can actually be a bonus. :-)


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Re: [Freedos-user] One use case for FreeDos

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Sat, Jan 27, 2024 at 4:51 PM Dan Schmidt via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Now, that's an interesting use for a Dos/FreeDOS retro computer:
>
> https://www.theverge.com/2014/5/14/5716232/george-r-r-martin-uses-dos-wordstar-to-write
>
> How many computers destined for the landfill still have perfectly good
> screens and keyboards?  (Recalling those heavy, grey, indestructible
> PS2 keyboards where the keys snapped back up with a vigour that
> seemed to sent your fingers flying on to the next character)  Now,
> I might have gone with WordPerfect 6 instead of WordStar 4, but the
> idea itself is solid: A computer that you just use for writing, sans
> distractions. No YouTube, no Email, no Facebook - you sit - you write.
> I mean, it's hard to argue it didn't work well for this guy!

I know I'm kind of an odd duck among my friends, but I'm with George
R.R. Martin on this. (Not the first time I've seen this article from
2014.) DOS is pretty good at the distraction-free environment,
necessitated by the limitations of the era. A distraction-free
environment is great for certain kinds of work, especially writing.

Actually, I've seen other, similar articles from different writers who
do the same. There's an example of a professional screenwriter (don't
remember the name) who still used a DOS word processor in 2020 to
write movie scripts. It was specialized software aimed at writing
scripts, and it only ran on DOS. This person said they had an office
set up just for writing, with a dedicated DOS-only laptop for writing.
If he needed to look up something on the Internet (or wanted to check
email) he had a separate computer for that. I'm not sure how he
transferred files from DOS to his other computer, but you can use a
USB drive for that.

There's a lot of DOS software that's still great in 2024. And I'd
argue some tools haven't gotten much better since the DOS days. My
favorite spreadsheet (on any platform) is As Easy As on DOS. That saw
me through my undergraduate program. If I didn't need to share
spreadsheets with anyone else, I think As Easy As could manage 99% of
my spreadsheet needs. And probably 100% if I just accepted that some
things worked differently (only 16 text colors and 16 background
colors for conditional formatting of cells, for example .. As Easy As
ran in VGA mode so could do 16 background colors).

I also experimented with using Word for DOS 5.5 as a "distraction
free" writing environment, and it works well. Word 5.5 uses modern
keybindings like ctrl-c to copy, ctrl-v to paste, etc (I didn't use
earlier versions of Word, might be the same there too, don't know) so
my fingers don't have to re-learn how to select text. If I did more
writing that didn't require special formatting (I rely on styles for
my tech writing these days) I'd probably be able to get by with Word
5.5. And LibreOffice Writer can read the files, too.


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Re: [Freedos-user] What DOS programs represent the 1980s and early 90s?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Jim Hall wrote:
> > Same for word processors. We used a few word processors at home,
> > probably copies of whatever my parents were using at work.
[..]
> > I looked through the shareware
> > catalog(*) I subscribed to, and ordered a copy of the most highly
> > rated word processor: Galaxy. It was "only" $100 which was a lot for
> > a student, but much less than the student edition of WordPerfect.

Alvah Whealton wrote:
> I used Galaxy for a long time. Does anyone know if it is possible to
> find a legal version of that program anywhere?

If you mean a legit registered but free/gratis version, then I don't.
I've only been able to find the unregistered shareware version for
download. I don't think the developers behind Galaxy are in business
anymore, or I would have reached out to them to ask if they could
release the full registered version on a website somewhere. (For
example, TRIUS released the activation code for the last version of As
Easy As for DOS [shareware spreadsheet] on their official forums. So
you can go to the TRIUS forums if you want to get the code to use this
great shareware DOS spreadsheet.)


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] What DOS programs represent the 1980s and early 90s?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Mon, Jan 1, 2024 at 5:39 PM andrew fabbro via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Whatever programs are most representative, they might have been
> distributed as shareware.  There's still "trial software" today but
> not like going to a BBS and seeing hundreds of shareware packages,
> or getting a CD stuffed with them.
[..]


I agree! I first used DOS when DOS was new (1981) but by the time I
moved to university (1990) shareware had definitely taken hold. And
shareware was just as powerful as the "commercial off the shelf"
software but a fraction of the price. And that was a huge deal for a
university student.

We had Lotus 1-2-3 at home when I was in high school, and I learned a
bit about how to use it then. But as a physics student at university,
I bought my own copy of As Easy As spreadsheet (shareware). It came
with a manual that was great as a reference and to explore new
features.

Same for word processors. We used a few word processors at home,
probably copies of whatever my parents were using at work. So I
learned how to use WordPerfect. And I bought my own "student edition"
of WordPerfect when I went to university. When the new version came
out, I just couldn't afford it (the student edition was less
expensive, but still pricey) so I looked through the shareware
catalog(*) I subscribed to, and ordered a copy of the most highly
rated word processor: Galaxy. It was "only" $100 which was a lot for a
student, but much less than the student edition of WordPerfect.


(*) Did anyone else subscribe to a shareware catalog? I know you could
dial into a BBS to find shareware apps, but I found a catalog that
tested tons of shareware apps and games and listed the ones they
thought were the best. You sent in an order with a check (to cover
copying and shipping) and they mailed back one or more floppies with
copies of the shareware (original unregistered zips) that you picked.
I think they published a new catalog every few months. I'm sure that's
how I found As Easy As. I know I discovered Galaxy, Telix (modem
dialer and terminal, like Procomm) and Mercury (equation solver, from
the same person who wrote Borland Eureka) from that catalog. And a
bunch of games.


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[Freedos-user] What DOS programs represent the 1980s and early 90s?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

I'm thinking about doing a video that shows how to do real work on DOS. I
sometimes see comments on YouTube with people asking "could you really do
*work* with DOS?" And the answer is *of course you can, that happened every
day.*

So I'm collecting a list of things you'd do in the 80s and 90s with DOS to
do work. Sure, I'll put a game it two in there, but I'm focusing on getting
work done.

What programs or types of programs would you like to see?

__

**For myself:*
*I've done some videos about DOS apps, but nothing like "here's how I did
everyday work." When I think back to my 1980s and 1990s (especially the
early 90s) I think of my time at university as a physics undergrad. So
that's a spreadsheet and a word processor for sure. Probably make a simple
chart then include that chart in a "lab report" document (or at least leave
room in the document to print it when I print on a dot matrix printer).
Probably a dialup terminal to talk to the uni committee lab? File manager.
And a compiler to write my own tools.*

*The only difference is for the video I'll try to highlight FreeDOS distro
tools as much as possible, like Doszip for the file manager. *
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Re: [Freedos-user] FreeDOS 2024 calendar coming soon

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Jim Hall wrote:
[..]
>>> The anniversary is coming up in June 2024. I'm trying to finish a
>>> 2024 calendar that you can buy (at low cost, if you want it in print)
>>> or download (if you just want the images). I'm trying to finish
>>> grading a bunch of university classes that I teach, so I haven't had
>>> time to finish the calendar - but grades are due soon and the calendar
>>> will follow shortly after.
>>>


FYI: I've finished grading so now I'm starting on the calendar.

The calendar will be a series of screenshots of FreeDOS programs, and
possibly a little "info box" on each to talk about it. I'm open to
suggestions! Currently I'm thinking about these (not in order):

- FreeDOS command.com ("FreeCOM") version 0.60 [screenshot from FreeDOS Alpha 5]

- FreeDOS kernel 0.92 [screenshot from FreeDOS Beta 1]

- "Welcome to the FreeDOS install program (version 2.2)" [screenshot
from FreeDOS Beta 2]

- installing FreeDOS Kernel 2010 [screenshot from FreeDOS Beta 5]

- screenshot of FreeDOS Beta 9 boot CD menu

- screenshot of Block Drop

- screenshot of the standard 16-color (8 background colors) screen test

- screenshot of Edlin 2.23 [probably for May, because that was the
month Gregory released the first version of Edlin]

- screenshot of FreeDOS installer [from FreeDOS 1.0]

- screenshot of FDIMPLES [from FreeDOS 1.3]

- screenshot of "FreeDOS 1.3 - Install" [from FreeDOS 1.3]

- screenshot of FreeDOS 1.3 after it's booted to the command line



Of these, 5 are basically black with gray text (alpha 5 command.com,
beta 1 kernel, beta 2 install, edlin, and FreeDOS 1.3 after boot). And
4 are basically blue with text (beta 3 install, FreeDOS 1.0 install,
FDIMPLES, and FreeDOS 1.3 install). That might not be very visually
interesting - but probably interesting historically. Would you
recommend *not* using any of the above screenshots? Are there other
screenshots that you'd like to see instead?


Jim


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[Freedos-user] FreeDOS 2024 calendar coming soon

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

(I'm re-sharing this item from my virtual get-together "followup"
email so it gets seen by others)


The anniversary is coming up in June 2024. I'm trying to finish a
2024 calendar that you can buy (at low cost, if you want it in print)
or download (if you just want the images). I'm trying to finish
grading a bunch of university classes that I teach, so I haven't had
time to finish the calendar - but grades are due soon and the calendar
will follow shortly after.


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Re: [Freedos-user] Epson dot matrix printer emulator?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

That looks super interesting, and I think that fits my need - thanks. I'll
have to give this a try.





On Mon, Nov 20, 2023, 11:33 AM Ben Collver via Freedos-user <
freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> I wrote a post about how to do this on FreeDOS.  It converts Epson printer
> data to image or PDF.  DOSBox-X has similar Epson printer emulation built
> in, and you can install FreeDOS on that.
>
> Basically, the process goes like this:
>
> * Run prn2file to capture the printer data to a file.
> * Print from a DOS application as desired.
> * Run prn2file again to close the captured file.
> * Run escparse to convert the captured file to PDF.
>
> Details:
>
>
> https://gopher.tildeverse.org/tilde.pink/1/~bencollver/log/2022-06-15-print-quest/
>
> -Ben
>
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[Freedos-user] Epson dot matrix printer emulator?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

I'm looking for DOS software that will basically simulate an Epson dot
matrix printer. Like an FX-80.

Basic idea is that I should be able to print from a DOS program to a file,
then feed that file into this emulator so I can view the output.
Specifically looking for graphics mode printing (like charts from a
spreadsheet, etc) on the Epson.

Bonus if it actually simulates printing line by line as it draws on screen.
I don't need it to convert to an image file or PDF.

Any ideas? I figure someone out there wrote something like this, maybe as
shareware in the 1990s? Hoping someone can point me in the right direction.

Jim
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Re: [Freedos-user] Dunfield releases 40+ years of Source Code

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Tue, Nov 7, 2023, 5:15 AM hms--- via Freedos-user <
freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> This is indeed a treasure trove of material.
> Does anyone know where to find the user manuals and binary files?
>


The binary files are at https://dunfield.themindfactory.com/dnld.htm

>
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Re: [Freedos-user] Dunfield releases 40+ years of Source Code

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

This is super exciting! If I remember correctly, we recommended
Micro-C as a great free (gratis) C compiler for DOS. I remember using
it for several programs of my own at the time.

It would be great if Dave could have used a more standard open source
license (for example, any of the licenses from the Opensource.org
list). Using a standard, accepted open source license makes it easy
for everyone to understand what the person sharing the code intends.
Based on how brief the COPY.TXT file is, the BSD license might have
been a better choice and seems to match the intent (as far as I can
see at first read). But choosing a license is up to Dave.

On Sun, Nov 5, 2023 at 9:33 PM Louis Santillan via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Dave Dunfield has released what he calls "40+ years of source code".
>
> https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?f=7=97034
>
> https://dunfield.themindfactory.com/dnldsrc.htm
>
> What I find most interesting is the source to his C compiler, Micro-C.  Lots 
> of other tools other bits that are new to me.
>
> The terms seem liberal but not quite OSS.
> https://dunfield.themindfactory.com/dnld/sc/COPY.TXT
>
> Maybe in the line of BSD or MIT/X like licenses.
>
> If you would like to see the binary versions of some of these projects, you 
> can find them here.
> https://dunfield.themindfactory.com/dnld.htm
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Re: [Freedos-user] DosView, a modern image format viewer and converter

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

FYI: The DosView news item has been on the https://www.freedos.org/
website for the last few days. It's currently the top news item on the
FreeDOS website.


On Mon, Nov 6, 2023 at 5:01 AM Eric Auer via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
>
> Hi! SuperIlu is has recently released version 1.1 of DosView:
>
> https://github.com/SuperIlu/DosView
>
> It uses Allegro and compiles with DJGPP 12, so with a 386+ CPU,
> enough RAM and VESA, you can now view those WEBP, JPEG2000, TIFF
> and other modern file formats in truecolor graphics modes on DOS.
>
> You can convert images to other formats with DosView as well :-)
>
> A thread about it on BTTR:
>
> https://www.bttr-software.de/forum/board_entry.php?id=20798=0=time=0
>
> Interestingly, the newest DosView EXE UPXes from 1.5 to 0.6 MB :-)
>
> Cheers, Eric
>
>
>
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Re: [Freedos-user] Ré : New game for DOS using DJGPP - Open Source

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Juan wrote:
>  > I used DJGPP back in the 90s, and was a life changing experience for me:
>  > my first contact with GCC and free software.
>  >
>  > I never managed to finish any games back then, but I have released one
>  > recently, and the source code is available in case anyone is interested:
>  >
>  > https://git.usebox.net/gold-mine-run/about/
>  >
>  > There are also binaries available here:
>  >
>  > https://www.usebox.net/jjm/gold-mine-run/
>  >


I'd like to try this game, and maybe demo it on the FreeDOS YouTube
channel - but I haven't been able to run this game consistently on
FreeDOS. I think I need help.

I read the dosbox.conf file so I can see how to run the game.
Sometimes when I run it, the game actually runs (but unplayably fast)
and other times it just sits there and chews CPU. At first, I thought
it was because I tried to run SLOWDOWN, but sometimes the game doesn't
run if I have SLOWDOWN running, and sometimes the game doesn't run if
I don't have SLOWDOWN running. So it's not SLOWDOWN.

I'm running this on QEMU, if that helps:

qemu-system-i386 -enable-kvm -m 32 -boot menu=on -device sb16 -device
adlib -hda freedos.qcow2 -hdb mystuff.qcow2

The "freedos" drive is my C: drive (installed from T2310) and the
"mystuff" drive is my D: drive, where I extracted the gminer.zip file.


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] HIMEMX zip file dates

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Eric wrote:
> You can also find updates for JEMM and HIMEMX on Japheth's GitHub "Baron von 
> Riedesel", even his HIMEMSX to use more than 4 GB RAM :-)

Mercury Thirteen wrote:
[..]
> Looks like I fell behind on keeping up with all of Japheth's updates! The 
> downloads section at MercuryCoding.com has been updated with new versions of 
> HiMemX and JWasm as well. Thanks, Eric, for (indirectly) pointing this out to 
> me! :)
>

I didn't have the latest HIMEMX mirrored on Ibiblio, so I just grabbed
the copies you have. I checked the file contents, and they have been
touched since the original. For example, 3.38
(https://github.com/Baron-von-Riedesel/HimemX/releases) was released
Nov 21, 2022 and has file contents like this:

$ unzip -l HimemX338.zip
Archive:  HimemX338.zip
  Length  DateTimeName
-  -- -   
 6056  11-21-2022 13:01   HimemX.exe
 6056  11-21-2022 13:01   HimemX2.exe
 1954  04-16-2020 06:38   Readme.txt
 4871  11-21-2022 13:01   History.txt
81855  11-21-2022 13:01   HimemX.asm
  296  03-24-2020 01:56   Make.bat
  529  03-24-2020 01:58   Makefile
- ---
   101617 7 files


It looks like you modify the zip files when you mirror them. Your
version looks like this:

$ unzip -l 3.38/himemx338.zip
Archive:  3.38/himemx338.zip
  Length  DateTimeName
-  -- -   
0  09-23-2023 03:38   APPINFO/
  568  09-23-2023 03:38   APPINFO/HIMEMX.LSM
0  09-23-2023 03:38   BIN/
 6056  09-23-2023 03:38   BIN/HIMEMX.EXE
 2168  09-23-2023 03:38   BIN/UMBM.EXE
 6056  09-23-2023 03:38   BIN/HIMEMX2.EXE
0  09-23-2023 03:38   DOC/
0  09-23-2023 03:38   DOC/HIMEMX/
 1954  09-23-2023 03:38   DOC/HIMEMX/README.TXT
 4871  09-23-2023 03:38   DOC/HIMEMX/HISTORY.TXT
0  09-23-2023 03:38   SOURCE/
0  09-23-2023 03:38   SOURCE/UMBM/
  296  09-23-2023 03:38   SOURCE/UMBM/MAKE.BAT
12147  09-23-2023 03:38   SOURCE/UMBM/UMBM.ASM
0  09-23-2023 03:38   SOURCE/HIMEMX/
  296  09-23-2023 03:38   SOURCE/HIMEMX/MAKE.BAT
81855  09-23-2023 03:38   SOURCE/HIMEMX/HIMEMX.ASM
  529  09-23-2023 03:38   SOURCE/HIMEMX/MAKEFILE
- ---
   116796 18 files


(You sent your message on 9/23, so that explains the dates.)

Are you folding the source code into the "exe" zip file to create a package?


At least for the mirrored files on Ibiblio, I prefer to keep the files
as provided by the developer (Jerome creates packages, but the Files
Archive section is a straight mirror.) So I'll re-mirror the original
releases from GitHub.


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Re: [Freedos-user] EduQiz rel 2023

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Thu, Sep 28, 2023 at 2:58 PM Mateusz Viste via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Hello List,
>
> About a year ago I have created a graphical, quiz-like program as a
> pretext for my kids to get some hands-on with my 386 PC and learn a
> thing or two in the process. I named the program EduQiz and kept it
> private until now. Since I am quite satisfied about how it turned out, I
> decided to publish it today. Here it is:
>
> http://eduqiz.osdn.io/
>
[..]


Very cool! I've added a news item about it on the www.freedos.org website.

Since you mentioned in your email and on the website that "this is NOT
a 'ready to play' product: it is up to you to prepare your tests and
quizzes" I think it's safe to assume this shouldn't go into the
FreeDOS distribution. :-)


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] languages

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Joao wrote:
> > It's been a while since i use freedos on asus eeepc with portuguese from
> > portugal and if i recall i can't write the * with shift and *+" key and
> > since there is no numeric keypad.
>


Tom wrote:
[..]
> >  "i can't write the * with shift and *+" key"
> c) about the worst bug complaint ever. you don't deserve a better keyboard 
> driver ;(


It's not a bad bug complaint. According to Wikipedia (see link) the
asterisk (*) is on the plus (+) key in the Shifted position. It's next
to the "P" key. So "Shift and +" should produce "*" on a
Portuguese/Portugal keyboard.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_QWERTY_keyboard_language_variants#Portugal


*Also, telling someone "you don't deserve a better keyboard driver" is
not cool. :-( We're all in this together to create a welcoming
environment. Let's treat everyone with respect.


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[Freedos-user] Planning the FreeDOS "2024" calendar

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

I'm making a FreeDOS "2024" calendar, and looking for suggestions of
what screenshots to include in it. Any ideas?

The "2023" calendar came out in January 2023, but that's too late. I'm
planning to share the "2024" calendar in mid to late October so folks
can get a copy for Christmas gifts, or otherwise in time for the New
Year.

The calendar has an image for each month. We've always had a
screenshot of a FreeDOS program for each month (EDIT, FDIMPLES, ..).
I'm planning the same for the new calendar, plus a "sidebar" that has
some info about the program in the screenshot (like "The first version
of Edlin was released on... and is a line-based editor...")

Looking for suggestions of what screenshots you think would be great
to have in the calendar.

Also: Any important FreeDOS-related or DOS-related or "classic
PC"-related dates that you think should be marked on the calendar?


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Re: [Freedos-user] Announcement: lDebug release 6

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Jim Hall wrote:
> > Can you send me an announcement (in about 100 words) that I can
> > copy/paste into the news system?

C. Masloch wrote:
> Sure, I based it on yours with a few improvements:
>
> lDebug (that's with a small L) is a 86-DOS debugger that replaces the
> classic DOS Debug program. The latest version (release 6) is available
> today! The new version includes several cool new features and fixes
> bugs. Some features were suggested on the FreeDOS feature request
> tracker, including "style 2" and "style 3" alternative symbolic flag
> displays. Lists can be specified as words or dwords. The DT "dump text
> table" command can translate numbers to text. lDebug can read a config
> file on startup. More details are found [in the mailing list
> announcement] [1]. Get it from [the lDebug website] [2].

Thanks! I updated the news item with this one.


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] Announcement: lDebug release 6

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

> Hi Jim,
>
> I noticed that the file on ibiblio isn't updated yet [1]. Likewise the
> FreeDOS Software page [2] linked from the website [3]. Though both of
> these list 1.3 in their pathnames, so I'm not sure what the appropriate
> action would be. However, I do think that the website [3] should link to
> the most recent files.
>
> Browsing ibiblio I found that the freedos/files/repositories/latest/
> tree is even more outdated [4]. The ldebug/ subdirectory does have
> release 5, but the ldebug.zip file (in the latest/devel/ directory) says
> it is from 2022-04-04. The unstable tree has the same old files [5].


Jerome usually updates the installer repo with new packages, so I'm
leaving that to him.

However, the zip file is mirrored on ibiblio, here:
https://ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/dos/debug/ldebug/rel6/


> Finally, here's your news item quoted:
>
>
> > lDebug release 6
> > 2023-08-26 9:27am
> >
>> lDebug (that's with a small L) is a 86-DOS debugger that
>> replaces the classic DOS Debug program. The latest version
>> (release 6) is available today! The new version includes
>> several cool new features and fixes bugs. Some features
>> were suggested on the FreeDOS feature request tracker,
>> and include "style 2" and "style 3" alternative symbolic
>> flag displays.
>
> Fine so far.
>
> > You can display lists with leading keywords.
>
> This is wrong, there is no change to any data displays with the leading
> AS WORDS or AS DWORDS keywords. Rather, they can be specified on the
> *input* that a user gives in a list parameter [6]. This modifies how the
[..]

Well, I did my best trying to write a news item based on your 680-word
announcement, with 18 footnotes. It's not always easy to get it right.
:-)

Can you send me an announcement (in about 100 words) that I can
copy/paste into the news system?


Jim


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Re: [Freedos-user] Planning the next virtual get-together

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Sun, Aug 27, 2023 at 1:00 PM zerofive--- via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Is there a recording of the get-together? I couldn't attend due to personal 
> reasons. :(
>


Sorry, I don't record the virtual get-togethers for personal privacy reasons.


But maybe we'll see you at the next get-together?


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[Freedos-user] Planning the next virtual get-together

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Thanks to everyone for joining today's FreeDOS virtual get-together!

We had a great conversation about different topics, mostly about tech
topics - like programming, DOS apps, the wiki, and retrocomputing.

We'll plan the next virtual get-together for Sunday, September 24.
That will be focused on "social time" - get to meet other FreeDOS
users and developers as more than a screen name.


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Re: [Freedos-user] REMINDER: FreeDOS virtual get-together is tomorrow

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Hi everyone!

We're about 15 minutes away from the virtual get-together. Here's the
connection information, for anyone who needs it early:

https://bluejeans.com/909315200/0433

Meeting ID: 909 315 200
Passcode: 0433


Phone number: (if you are dialing in by phone)
+1.408.419.1715 (US / San Jose, Calif.)

*see all dial-in numbers (including other US numbers) at
https://www.bluejeans.com/numbers


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[Freedos-user] REMINDER: FreeDOS virtual get-together is tomorrow

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Sun, Aug 20, 2023 at 10:29 AM Jim Hall  wrote:
[..]
> Let's do it! Plan for our FreeDOS virtual get-together for NEXT
> SUNDAY, August 27 at 11am US/Central. (Use your favorite timezone
> converter to find your local time.) We usually alternate topics every
> month (technical v social) but we didn't get to meet last month - so
> this meeting will be focused on "technical."


Hi everyone!

Just sharing a quick reminder about tomorrow's (Aug 27) virtual
get-together at 11am US/Central. I'll send the URL shortly before the
meeting starts.

The meeting is on BlueJeans. We've found that you may get video "lag"
if you connect using only a web browser ("web client") but performance
is much better if you download the (free) desktop client:
https://www.bluejeans.com/downloads


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Re: [Freedos-user] Announcement: lDebug release 6

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Great news, thanks! I've been following the feature request discussion
on the tracker, so it's great to see the new version with the cool new
changes.

There's a lot in this announcement (because so many new features) so I
wasn't able to reproduce all of that in the news item for the website,
but I did my best. :-)


Jim

On Sat, Aug 26, 2023 at 9:31 AM C. Masloch via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Hello list,
>
> I finished release 6 of lDebug (with a small L) today. This is my
> advanced 86-DOS debugger project based on FreeDOS Debug/X (in turn based
> on MS-DOS Debug), with some ideas from DR-DOS Debug. The duration since
> the prior release 5 is back to less than 6 months as opposed to the year
> between releases 4 and 5. Apart from the usual amount of bugfixes, there
> are some new features.
>
> If the debugger is not bootloaded (that is, loaded as a DOS application
> or DOS device driver) then some of the boot-specific code and messages
> is discarded, saving some resident memory. The ATTACH command [1] does
> the opposite of the TSR command, allowing a device-mode debugger to
> attach to a process. The K command is a synonym to N usually, to stay
> compatible to my MSDebug build [2]. .HEX files can be read now.
>
> Some features were suggested on the sourceforge.net FreeDOS feature
> tracker. These include style 2 and style 3 alternative symbolic flag
> displays [3]. The E, F, and S commands allow specifying lists with
> leading keywords like "AS WORDS" or "AS DWORDS" [4] [5]. The DT (dump
> text table) command [6] allows to generate an ASCII table [7], a table
> of the top half of the 8-bit space, or to dump the bytes of a specified
> number as text [8]. The H command displays the remainder if the
> outermost operator is a division [9].
>
> Another feature suggested there [3] is the debugger will attempt to read
> a configuration file on startup now, either from the directory specified
> in the %LDEBUGCONFIG% variable, or else the same directory as the lDebug
> executable. This is described a bit in the manual section on "Invoking
> the debugger as an application" [10]. Further, when a Script for lDebug
> (.SLD) file is not found it is searched for in the directory specified
> by the %LDEBUGSCRIPTS% variable [12], or also the debugger executable
> directory.
>
> The INSTALL and UNINSTALL commands were extended with many new nouns for
> reconfiguring the debugger [11] without having to look up cryptic
> numbers to set or clear in the Debugger Common Options (DCO) variables.
>
> There is a new mode called RH mode [12], which allows the RH command
> [13] to replay any of the last several dozen register dumps from the
> debugger's auxiliary buffer. While on the topic of the auxiliary buffer,
> the application mode and device driver mode init of the debugger gained
> the ability to grow this buffer to up to 24 KiB, beyond its minimum size
> of just above 8 KiB. This is done by passing an /A switch to the
> debugger's init [10]. Because it is done in the init, this costs very
> little amounts of resident space.
>
> Another two features are done in the debugger init, costing no space in
> the resident debugger. The first is the /P switch (or component /PE and
> /PS switches) to guess a filename extension and do a path search for the
> specified file. The second is a warning for an unknown filename
> extension, which can be disabled with a /PW- switch.
>
> Finally, the default build of the debugger gained the run time option to
> install interrupt 0Dh and interrupt 0Ch handlers in Real/Virtual 86
> Mode, using an INSTALL INTFAULTS command [11]. Most physical machines in
> Real 86 Mode, and the most recent dosemu2 VMM in Virtual 86 Mode, will
> dispatch faults in 86 Mode to these handlers. However, the same handlers
> are usually invoked for two different IRQs. The debugger's handlers will
> query the Programmable Interrupt Controller (PIC) to find out whether a
> corresponding IRQ is being serviced; if it is then the debugger will
> pass along the call to the downlink of its handler. Otherwise, it is
> treated as a fault.
>
> The release packages are available from our server [14] as usual. The
> fdpkg subdirectory [15] has a FreeDOS package that I prepared. The
> svardpkg subdirectory [16] has executable and source SvarDOS packages.
> The repo history up to the release can be read in our hgweb [17]. The
> News chapter of the manual has a section on release 6 [18].
>
> Regards,
> ecm
>
>
> [1]: https://pushbx.org/ecm/doc/ldebug.htm#cmdattach
> [2]: https://pushbx.org/ecm/doc/msdebug.htm#cmdn
> [3]: https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/feature-requests/93/
> [4]: https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/feature-requests/102/
> [5]: https://pushbx.org/ecm/doc/ldebug.htm#parlist
> [6]: https://pushbx.org/ecm/doc/ldebug.htm#cmddt
> [7]: https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/feature-requests/105/
> [8]: https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/feature-requests/99/
> [9]: https://sourceforge.net/p/freedos/feature-requests/100/
> [10]: 

Re: [Freedos-user] Online Get-together

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

Jerome wrote:
>> I think the monthly online get-together is today.

Jim wrote:
> We haven't scheduled the August get-together, and today I have another
> video call at that time (family call).
>
> However, how about a virtual get-together next Sunday, August 27?

Jerome wrote:
> Sounds good.
>
> If it was today, I wasn’t sure if I could have make it.

I think we've usually scheduled the FreeDOS virtual get-togethers for
the 4th Sunday of a month. That's because I usually do my family video
call on the 3rd Sunday of a month. :-)


Let's do it! Plan for our FreeDOS virtual get-together for NEXT
SUNDAY, August 27 at 11am US/Central. (Use your favorite timezone
converter to find your local time.) We usually alternate topics every
month (technical v social) but we didn't get to meet last month - so
this meeting will be focused on "technical."

As usual, I'll share the URL here on the email list (and the website,
and Facebook, and Mastodon) shortly before the meeting starts. We'll
use BlueJeans, which you can use via a web browser (they recommend
Chrome) although you may see a video lag. We find you get better
performance if you download the (free) desktop client.


Also: BlueJeans has announced they will be closing down, sometime in
the "first half of 2024." So I'm starting to look again at other video
meeting options, for the few times that I need to do remote workshops
for my consulting practice. (Most of my work in the last year has been
in-person.) We might experiment with some of these later this year.
:-)


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Re: [Freedos-user] Online Get-together

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

We haven't scheduled the August get-together, and today I have another
video call at that time (family call).

However, how about a virtual get-together *next Sunday*, August 27?

On Sun, Aug 20, 2023, 8:03 AM Jerome Shidel via Freedos-user <
freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> I think the monthly online get-together is today.
>
>
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Re: [Freedos-user] How do I change screen resolution?

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Sun, Aug 6, 2023, 7:40 AM EdzUp via Freedos-user <
freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net> wrote:

> Hi all, I could cobble together a Command line app to chuck the system
> into VGA/SVGA resolutions :)
>


But this is just a special case of the MODE command, which can already set
the screen to use (for example) 50 lines.
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Re: [Freedos-user] (C library) SvarLANG ver 20230730

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Tue, Aug 1, 2023 at 9:38 AM Mateusz Viste via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> I have recently released a new version of SvarLANG. SvarLANG is a C
> library and toolset for enabling DOS applications to easily support
> multiple languages.
[..]
>
> http://svardos.org/svarlang/


Thanks, Mateusz!

I posted a news item about it for the FreeDOS website, but I wanted to
ask before I mirrored a copy to ibiblio. Would you like me to make a
copy at the FreeDOS files archive at ibiblio?


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Re: [Freedos-user] Dos

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Thu, Jul 20, 2023 at 5:14 PM Rahim Fakir via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Whats The main Diference between freedos and dos.
> Which os The best, dos freedos runs a 486?


As Bryan said, FreeDOS is a more modern version of DOS.

Also, FreeDOS is open source software. Very early versions of MS-DOS
(v1.25 and v2.0, at https://github.com/microsoft/MS-DOS) are available
under an open source license, but these were very primitive versions
of "DOS" that don't have a lot of functionality. For example, MS-DOS
2.0 was the first version to support directories.

You also can't download (legally) a "freeware" copy of MS-DOS, that I
know of (certainly not one that is of much use, such as MS-DOS 5 or
MS-DOS 6.x).

By "more modern," we mean that FreeDOS has more features and includes
more tools than MS-DOS ever did. For example, the FreeDOS distribution
includes apps and tools, including some network utilities. We also
include compilers and assemblers and editors, so you can write your
own DOS apps to run on FreeDOS.

And yes, FreeDOS will run on a '486 CPU.


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Re: [Freedos-user] My curiosity

[Jim Hall via Freedos-user]

On Mon, Jul 24, 2023 at 3:46 PM Daniel Essin via Freedos-user
 wrote:
>
> Hello,
>
> I'm following this list and find it very interesting. I found it when I
> was trying to prepare myself to help a friend whose business in built
> around a DOS app. It's clear that many/most/all? have access to other
> computers and OSes. This would be obvious if only because one needs
> access to the internet even if only to get this list. This has made me
> curious.
>
> What are others using freedos for: business, curiosity, running retro
> games and apps for fun, to avoid total dependence on the evil empire, or
> something else?
>


Hi Dan

We ran a survey several years ago, and then last year, to answer
exactly that question: How are people using FreeDOS?

Several years ago (around 2014?) we found people were running FreeDOS
for 3 or 4 main use cases:

1. To play classic DOS games
2. To run legacy DOS applications
3. To support/develop embedded systems

and sometimes 4. To install firmware updates on certain motherboards

I recall that the legacy DOS software was often in a business setting,
such as organizations that needed to retrieve information from an old
DOS application. You discover that some data is locked up in some data
files that are only accessible by the program that wrote the data. So
you find the software (or download it if you don't have it), then
install FreeDOS + the application, and "save as" the data to some
format that you can use.

We did this when I served as CIO for a university. One of the faculty
found some old floppies with old research data. They wanted to get the
data back (I think to write a paper that referenced the historical
data). We installed FreeDOS on a spare PC that had a floppy drive,
found the original program on a DOS apps archive site, installed that,
and loaded the data. That program could also dump the data into a
plain text file (similar to CSV) which the faculty researcher could
load into a spreadsheet to do further analysis.

More recently, we found that people were running FreeDOS for (mostly)
3 main uses:

1. To play classic DOS games
2. To run legacy DOS applications
3. To develop new DOS programs

For #3, I think that mostly represented FreeDOS developers responding
to the survey.

The survey had a few outliers (we still see people who use FreeDOS to
install firmware updates, for example) but in 2022, those were pretty
low compared to the other 3 uses.


Jim


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