DOS apps will run under Win7 32-bit, but not 64-bit.
-Original Message-
From: dmccunney [mailto:dennis.mccun...@gmail.com]
Sent: Thursday, January 10, 2013 11:37 AM
To: Discussion and general questions about FreeDOS.
Subject: Re: [Freedos-user] Freedos V2.0 - when will it be available?
On Thu, Jan 10, 2013 at 8:29 AM, Rugxulo rugx...@gmail.com wrote:
On Thu, Jan 10, 2013 at 12:10 AM, dmccunney
dennis.mccun...@gmail.com wrote:
Like I said, Win2k / XP aren't that bad, though they have
quite a few
catches and omissions. It gets worse later on, but it depends on
whether you think the tradeoff is worth it (or have the time,
patience, knowledge, desire to bother trying to install older stuff
and accept incomplete functionality).
XP works fine here. 2K works fine on an older box that doesn't have
the RAM to properly run XP. I avoided Vista, but Win7 works well on
the SOs laptop.
The issues here haven't been whether something runs - it's been UI
changes, and figuring out where MS put a particular function in the
new version, because you don't get to it like you did before.
(DOS apps don't run at all under Win7, unless you use a VM, but I
found a version that does of the only DOS app the SO used - a DOS port
of the old Unix game Larn.)
I din't care about DOS compatibility - the DOS stuff I used all ran
fine in an NTVDM.
Trust me, it's not as perfect as it seems, though yes, for what it
does, it does fairly well.
I didn't say it was perfect. I said it worked for me.
Like I said elsewhere, it ran all the DOS stuff *I* used with no
problem so I essentially didn't *care*.
That's more of a coincidence (or your minimal needs) than a true
testament to compatibility. Simply put, most people didn't care
anymore or preferred heavier APIs, but having an incomplete /
half-broken subsystem doesn't help them stay firm either.
Yes. So?
I freely admit NTVDM and DOS compatibility leave somewhat to be
desired, and there will be stuff that doesn't run or will have
problems.
I don't care, because it works for what I do with it.
Granted, perhaps DOS native binaries aren't the easiest or greatest
things to lug around for ages, but I don't know of a true
universal
solution. Scripts? (Lua?) Bytecode? (Inferno?) We probably shouldn't
have separate binaries for every single x86 OS, but for some people,
source compatibility is good enough. Too bad they make so many
horrible assumptions in the process.
There's no such thing as a true universal solution. (But then, how
many folks *need* one? Most folks either just run one platform, or
don't *expect* to have the same programs available everywhere. The
folks most interested will be *developers* trying to target multiple
platforms.)
The closest is a Write once, run anywhere solution like Java. Code
is compiled to a tokenized binary targeted at an arbitrary virtual
machine implemented by the Java runtime. If there *is* a Java runtime
for what you have, the code will run on it. Java runtimes exist for
almost everything. (You still have to be aware of various issues -
it's possible to write non-portable code in Java.)
You lug about DOS native binaries and deal with compatibility issues
because you either haven't found anything else that will do the same
job, or there is something but you would rather deal with the issues
than switch.
One interesting trend is wider use of scripting, because current
hardware can run script languages fast enough to make them competitive
with other languages. I'm seeing an increasing amount of stuff
written in Python, which is available for Windows, Linux, and OS/X,
using widget libraries like Qt so it largely looks and acts the same
on any supported platform.
__
Dennis
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