Re: [Freedos-user] Ré : Way or utility in Freedos to have two applications running
Tangentially related, but a system called lEET/OS has been linked here and there recently: "a graphical shell and partially posix-compliant multitasking operating environment that runs on top of a DOS kernel. /.../ lEEt/OS is slowly but surely migrating from FreeDOS to ST-DOS, its own DOS kernel." http://sininenankka.dy.fi/~sami/fdshell/index.php So it's a separate system, a Beta at this point, but nonetheless interesting (also considering a possible toy project of my own :). A video on the multitasking in action: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fInrnUvrVgQ Best, Mart On Fri, 12 Apr 2024 at 16:46, Ramon Riera Marès via Freedos-user wrote: > > Hello everyone. I have found this utility. It doesn't seem to work with > Freedos. The application starts but the configuration file not work. Probably > can't find any ms-dos files. > > A utility of this type would be interesting for Freedos. > > https://vetusware.com/download/PC-Mix/?id=8992 > > In any case, I am happy with SideKick's solution. > > Thanks all. > > Thanks Freedos !!! > > Ramon Riera > > El jue, 11 abr 2024 a las 19:39, Ramon Riera Marès () > escribió: >> >> Dear Liam and Tomas. >> >> Well, I'll be a good boy and won't do it anymore. The topic of hallucinating >> gives me a bad feeling. >> >> But searching I found the Pc-mix utility that if it works with Freedos we >> will have "Human Hallucination" :-) >> >> Today I will try it with Freedos. >> >> Thanks and regards, >> >> Ramón Riera >> >> El jue, 11 abr 2024 a las 14:33, Tomas By via Freedos-user >> () escribió: >>> >>> On Thu, 11 Apr 2024 14:10:24 +0200, Liam Proven via Freedos-user wrote: >>> > LLM bots are not "AI", they are marketing BS. >>> >>> True. >>> >>> > [...] and they emit total nonsense >>> >>> Well, not always. It's like 50/50. >>> >>> /Tomas >>> >>> >>> ___ >>> Freedos-user mailing list >>> Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net >>> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user > > ___ > Freedos-user mailing list > Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] Coding in BASIC for Freedos?
> I know it might sound kind of anti-progressive or even silly, to argue with > »slowing down« things. »Multi Tasking« is (was?) a lie. It isn’t real for us > humans in a good sense. Single user, single task - in 2024!> Definitely echoing this idea (not quite sure about the "lie" part, though :). Single-tasking is one of the main things that has always drawn me to DOS. I definitely have had successful ten-windows-open-and-using-all-of-them type sessions, but for the most part, I try to keep open windows to a minimum, and the same goes to visual elements of all kind on the screen. I've also been serious about writing; these days occasionally producing radio programs that need lots of really careful editing. No idea why, but this kind of mindset -- a *very strong* urge to get rid of everything that is not needed, or rather, to work with just the bare essentials in terms of tools -- seems to be quite common for people involved in the arts. For many of them, particularly writers, DOS and single-threading may seem extremely compelling. One program, one process. Even though I'm not a programmer, I can have a *sense* of actually understanding the whole system in DOS. Obviously this is not necessary these days -- but it creates a different kind of peace of mind. And I'm a strong believer in the idea that simpler tools *may* result in more dense creative works. Constraints are inspiring. A quote paraphrased by many, but current googling attributes it to Saint-Exupery: "It seems that perfection is attained not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing more to remove." I have a huge admiration for people that stubbornly create remarkable things in 2024 for/with very modest hardware -- see e.g. stuff by Nils M. Holm [1] or Charles Childers [2]. (Some of their things should also work in DOS; NMH in particular has written quite a bit of interesting things for DOS in the past; apparently he also re-vitalized his 1994 BASIC interpreter fairly recently [3].) So, there are brains that simply seem to much prefer very simple systems; I've been like this ever since childhood. I would love to be able to do professional-level audio montage work in the single-tasking environment of DOS, but, realistically, this is a pipe dream :). (I have coneptualized a text-only audio montage system long ago, and audio for more contemporary sound cards in DOS seems to make quite a bit of progress these days. But I'm definitely not a capable programmer, to put it mildly, and I should first invest a lot of time in properly teaching myself about how computers/DOS actually utilizes memory. However, the core of my idea -- doing audio montage *without seeing a waveform at all* -- has that same less-is-more style appeal: work solely by trusting your ears. Because in a text-only system there is no waveform rendering, all montage decisions should be made exclusively by relying on the sense of hearing, not visual perception. So: maybe it *would* result in radio shows (the stuff I do are kind of long-form philosophy lectures) that have a different "feel" as compared to shows that are cut with contemporary, almost entirely screen-based digital audio workstations (DAWs)? Who knows. I'm definitely attached to this idea. And doing all of this in DOS, on my ~2009 spookily quiet fanless Dell Mini 9 (8.9 inch display) which I bought for something like 5-20 euros would be icing on that cake. :) But, yeah, realistically, radio work will continue in Linux and Ardour for now -- which in itself is an excellent tool with a truly incredible main developer.) But... I still feel a special peace of mind and happiness every time I boot into DOS with the Mini 9. There *is* more about this simplicity than just nostalgia and a need to experience something "retro". BTW, @Thomas Desi -- your musings on the "Why DOS" topic are really thoghtful, always a joy to read and think along. Thanks for sharing! 1: http://t3x.org/ 2: http://konilo.org/ and http://retroforth.org/ 3: http://t3x.org/nmhbasic/index.html ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] One use case for FreeDos
A "distraction free" writing environment was probably one of the reasons I tested out FreeDOS at one point. I think it must also be the fastest-booting distraction-free system of its kind these days? Even as compared to some bare-bones ram-booted Linux like my beloved Tiny Core [1]. It literally takes 2 seconds to press the power button and get to the text editor that is configured to auto-launch via autoexec.bat. I think the idea of having a system that can be configured with just 2 files (config.sys and autoexec.bat) might also appeal to many of those distraction free system seeker types. The entire system is at your fingertips, and well understandable to tech-curious-but-not-uber-geeky users. Also, I've started to teach our son programming with QBasic (it feels kind of weird to state this - but it is till an incredibly good teaching environment and language, particularly for children who are non-native English speakers). Currently we're using dosemu on Linux, but I've often thought that a bootable USB thumb drive with FreeDOS/SvarDOS and QBasic launched via autoexec.bat would make an even better environment. A lock-in, in a positive sense -- the child would not feel the urge to alt-tab to Minercaft or Firefox if he is booted to a system where all he can do is use QBasic. It would also be impossible to mess things up with keypresses that conflict with the main OS (Linux or Windows; we've had an issue with him always pressing the Windows key by accident). I have already observed that the Blue Screen of QBasic does create a noticeable "flow state" of learning for our 10yo son. Especially when paired with the instant feedback the user gets from an environment like QBasic. In fact, I actually went as far as translating a great QBasic tutorial by Ted Felix into our language (Estonian) [2]. It is a joy to watch a 2024 10yo kid Actually Reading The Spiral-Bound Printout and typing in the exercises. n=1, but I can confirm that this "oldschool" way of teaching programming does still seem to work, provided you have teaching material as good as this Ted Felix tutorial (and, maybe, a child who already likes to read paper books). 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. Greetings from Estonia, Mart 1: http://tinycorelinux.net/ 2: http://tedfelix.com/qbasic/ (Haven't made my translation public yet - nor informed the author -, but eventually might do this as well.) On 28/01/2024, Jim Hall via Freedos-user wrote: > 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
Re: [Freedos-user] freedos, or dos based mail clients?
Hi, On 22/11/2023, Eric Auer via Freedos-user wrote: > Does anybody here have experience with using a squirrelmail > or roundcoube webmail in links? Might need less java script > compared to gmail to use those, and one could forward the > gmail mail to a mail provider with squirrelmail or roundcube. I did use SquirrelMail in Links & text-mode Linux 1-2 years ago. IIRC, Navigating frames (which SM uses) was slightly annoying, but doable. Because it is simple HTML, it should be possible to skip SM's side pane altogether and only display the mailbox view, though. Even if it was (due to the frames) not exactly a streamlined experience, I was definitely able to read and write mails, so for smaller workloads, it is fine. There is also the w3m text browser, which had handy vi-like keybindings etc, but the tables and frames rendering is not as good as in Links. Apparently there has been a DJGPP-based port, but (after some googling) it might have been from ~20 years ago. http://w3m.rocks/ https://github.com/albfan/w3m/blob/master/doc/README (confirmation on the DOS port) I can't remember if I ever tried to use Gmail with w3m, though. In any case, Links was better at this. I was actually going to suggest the exact same solution (forwarding Gmail to a SM-based account). I'll very probably have to go the same route myself, because Gmail's default view always feels a bit "too much of everything". Or ditch Gmail altogether, finally... :) Not easy, because it is already tied to a bunch of online services. FWIW, I have an Unix shell account at sdf.org -- they are using NetBSD, and here are the mail tools available from the command line: http://sdf.lonestar.org/index.cgi?faq?EMAIL?02 (I've only used SquirrelMail from them, though, and maybe tested Pine.) Might be a DOS History 101 level question, but I'm definitely more of an end-user, so I dare :) -- Historically, what was actually the reason why DOS didn't catch up with networking (as compared to Unix-land)? Security issues, the system being single-user, etc? I remember being somewhat surprised when I realized there really aren't that many simple mail clients for DOS available. Best, Mart ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
Re: [Freedos-user] MSdos 7.1 question / Sound in DOS and FAT huge file support
On 01/11/2023, Eric Auer via Freedos-user wrote: > > It should be possible to use MPXPLAY to get DOS sound > with modern hardware: https://mpxplay.sourceforge.net/ I can confirm that MPXPLAY may work out of the box with Intel HDA. Tested on a Dell Mini 9, which has the Realtek ALC268 card. Played back mp3 and also a 24bit 48kHz wav file flawlessly on SvarDOS. (In case there's no sound from speakers, read about the "-scc" flag in docs/FAQ.txt. The documentation is comprehensive and great.) Really happy about all this, since a minor part of my work includes using at least 24-bit audio. Hoping to cobble together some mpxplay-based script for wav slicing now -- for Getting To Do More Real Work In Actual DOS, yay. :) Will try 32-bit wav with mpxplay soon as well. Haven't tested sbemu, but here are some more projects for HDA and-or AC97 support on DOS (haven't tried any of these either): - HX DOS Extender 2.17+ added HDA support in 2016: http://www.bttr-software.de/forum/board_entry.php?id=14645=0=time=0 - VSBHDA, a recent dosemu fork: https://github.com/Baron-von-Riedesel/VSBHDA - A bare metal wav player (not TSR) and HDA status controller: https://github.com/Baron-von-Riedesel/HDAutils - "micro or nano" extender with an example for HDA playback: https://github.com/Baron-von-Riedesel/DOS32pae - An AC97 wav player: https://github.com/volkertb/ich2player - ICH sound driver development: https://github.com/volkertb/ail32-ich Best, Mart ___ Freedos-user mailing list Freedos-user@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-user
