On 10/24/2020 3:26 PM, Jim Hall wrote:
On Sat, Oct 24, 2020 at 6:06 PM Jerome Shidel <jer...@shidel.net
<mailto:jer...@shidel.net>> wrote:
Hi,
If I don’t mention removing or keeping something, I don’t have
much of an opinion on it.
Over time, FreeDOS has grown to include lots of interesting
programs. The FreeDOS 1.2 and 1.3RCx distributions are very big.
As we look to the next FreeDOS 1.3 Release Candidate, I think we
should consider removing some packages from the FreeDOS distribution.
We will definitely need to do that eventually. As thing are now,
it will continue to grow and grow and at some point we will be
forced to ship it as a DVD or 2 CD set.
Yeah, I'm trying to avoid turning FreeDOS into a multi-CD software
set. It's DOS. It should be small. :-)
I would tend to disagree -not that DOS is small (yes, it ought to be);
but that a multi-cd software set would be a bad thing. We don't really
have BBS' and such any more and god only knows about the things you find
on archive.org and such sites. I think having a dev cd and game cd
wouldn't be a horrible thing -though it may be from a maintenance point
of view.
But from my point of view, that's the better way to go.
My largest problem with what is provided in FreeDOS is the
organizational scheme. It's too crowded and unix-centric.
What DOS was, in my mind, was simple. You didn't really have an entire
tree with documents in one place, helpfiles in another and LSM files in
a third. You had -for MS DOS, c:\dos. Everything was there.
It's been a long time, but I think PC-DOS may have had some folders with
help files -so it was like DOS -> DOS\help or something? It's been ages
and I could be misremembering but that would still be simple enough for me.
Obviously everything in one folder that would be a horrible idea for
FreeDOS, I'm not sure what to suggest apart from that. One thing I would
suggest -probably not for the upcoming release, would be to consider a
less overwhelming layout. LSM files ought to be with the source since
they're used by the developers, and instead of trying to recreate a
unix-style of tree i'd suggest having the base programs in fdos,
helpfiles in fdos\help\$program, READMES and program documents in
fdos\docs\$program and the rest put off into a seperate developer tree.
perhaps c:\src.fd\$program and (in the case of LSM files)
c:\src.fd\$program\lsm and so on.
I like the way that the dev tools are put off into the develop folder
now, and I'd expand on that -maybe have an opt folder for miscellaneous
programs (instead of putting them in c:\)?
To touch briefly on your original email, I think that the net packages
should remain as they are -especially if you're going to include less on
cd and people will need to be able to connect and use fdnpkg to install
things from ibiblio.
I'd like to see tar and gzip stay in base simple because using pcem and
86box I have had problems creating zipfiles (usually out of memory
errors). Tar and gzip have usually been more reliable for me. I could
simply fetch them from the unix collection, but it's convient having
them in base.
Editors; I use msedit and the FreeDOS editor; I don't really use vim,
pico or the others.
Development; your decisions work for me. I never use perl on dos and I
try to avoid djgpp and GCC-IA16. I end up needing NASM, JWASM, OW, UPX
and FreeBASIC. Would it be possible to replace bwbasic with gw-basic?
I'd like to see both lfndos and doslfn kept, but as long as one's
available I am ok.
Myself, I never use the desktops and I'd almost suggest moving them to
c:\windows ...or a similar idea ;)
Anyway, that's my thoughts -ty for keeping the torch lit and aloft!
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