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Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

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Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#41

Post by dcrazy »

TheSkyHasEyes wrote: post #33
BeetleB wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was looking back to why I enjoyed computing so much more in the 80's and 90's compared to now, and of the many reasons, one of them was "No multitasking". Or even "little multitasking" because while Windows had multitasking, we didn't have the HW to do too many things at the same time. Right now we're on the crazy end of that spectrum. Every tab on your browser is potentially an application, and we multitask like c…

> enjoyed computing so much more in the 80's Also the days when you turned on a computer it was ready to rock within two seconds. A few friends were discussing video game load times throughout the years. Overall the elapsed times haven't changed much at all.

That does not match my memory at all. Booting my family’s 386, even into DOS, was a minutes-long affair involving memory tests and messages like “loading HIMEM.SYS”.

Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#42

Post by clickety_clack »

Dwedit wrote: post #30

Not a fan of the pre-collapsed sections of an article. I was wondering where the text was.

Same here. We use notion at work, and I’m often sent notes with a handful of lines of fairly bland text, which I dismiss. I only sometimes later realize that there was more text hiding under those visible lines.

I’m not really going to put any cognitive effort into fully concentrating on something like this to the point where I see that there is something that looks like it might be an expansion button. If I’m supposed to see it, it should be visibly on the page.

Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#43

Post by dboreham »

dcrazy wrote: post #40
ndiddy wrote: post #34

> This is a major release of Windows and, similarly to the previous one [ep 10], it is not a complete operating system, but it’s simply a graphical user shell that is meant to be run on top of MS-DOS; thus, it inherently gains its limitations, albeit the developers had time to fix some things with this release, as well as add new features such as icons on the desktop and keyboard shortcuts. This is largely untrue. Wh…

I would posit that Windows only became more technically sophisticated than early Mac OS with the release of Windows/386, the version of Windows 2.1 that ran multiple DOS VMs in protected mode.

Depends how you define sophisticated. Mac used the 68k so didn't have to jump through all those hoops mentioned above.

Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#44

Post by dcrazy »

dboreham wrote: post #43
dcrazy wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would posit that Windows only became more technically sophisticated than early Mac OS with the release of Windows/386, the version of Windows 2.1 that ran multiple DOS VMs in protected mode.

Depends how you define sophisticated. Mac used the 68k so didn't have to jump through all those hoops mentioned above.

I’m distinguishing “sophistication” from “complexity”. Windows/386 is “sophisticated” in that it implements a much richer model of execution than its predecessors, with a supervising kernel and memory-protected virtual DOS machines. This is different from the complexity of programming with segmented memory, or punching through the various layers of backward compatibility that had built up even as early as the 286.

Likewise, the Mac had some complexities of its own, even though the 68k wasn’t nearly as challenging to program for. Since the Toolbox shipped in ROM, they had to design syscalls (A-traps) in a way that could be patched by later versions of the system software. They soon had to work around software that wasn’t 32-bit clean when they started shipping machines with the 68020.

One of the more sophisticated bits of later Mac OS was the 68k virtual machine that was used to run major chunks of the Toolbox on PowerPC Macs.

Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#45

Post by jnpnj »

NikolaNovak wrote: post #23
BirAdam wrote: post #15

Fun fact, while Trower was the manager who got Windows moving, it was Gabe Newell who served as the lead developer of Windows versions 1, 2, and 3. Win95 was the first version he wasn’t really involved with. By that time, he was working on porting Doom to Windows.

Sorry, are we saying Valve Gabe Newell? That's blowing my mind from both timeline and area perspective.

Yeah, I don't know why this never popped on my radar. I read Abrash books long ago, MS employees blog too, its history around the creation of UIs (xerox/apple and all that), the OS/2 era .. and I never saw his name (or maybe selective vision tricked me).

Very fun fact

Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#46

Post by anthk »

NikolaNovak wrote: post #23
BirAdam wrote: post #15

Fun fact, while Trower was the manager who got Windows moving, it was Gabe Newell who served as the lead developer of Windows versions 1, 2, and 3. Win95 was the first version he wasn’t really involved with. By that time, he was working on porting Doom to Windows.

Sorry, are we saying Valve Gabe Newell? That's blowing my mind from both timeline and area perspective.

Half Life 3.11 confirmed.

Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#47

Post by anthk »

ndiddy wrote: post #34

> This is a major release of Windows and, similarly to the previous one [ep 10], it is not a complete operating system, but it’s simply a graphical user shell that is meant to be run on top of MS-DOS; thus, it inherently gains its limitations, albeit the developers had time to fix some things with this release, as well as add new features such as icons on the desktop and keyboard shortcuts. This is largely untrue. Wh…

Windows 3.11 can run in vanilla DOSBox. Under DOSBox-X you basically boot Windows by converting DOSBox into a PC emulator.

Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#48

Post by blisscast »

Dwedit wrote: post #30

Not a fan of the pre-collapsed sections of an article. I was wondering where the text was.

I'm very sorry about that, we're testing this system as it's a brand new UI; we had left it closed not to overwhelm people, but we can leave it open by default if needed.

Re: Only one side will be the true successor to MS-DOS – Windows 2.x

#50

Post by saulpw »

dcrazy wrote: post #41
TheSkyHasEyes wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> enjoyed computing so much more in the 80's Also the days when you turned on a computer it was ready to rock within two seconds. A few friends were discussing video game load times throughout the years. Overall the elapsed times haven't changed much at all.

That does not match my memory at all. Booting my family’s 386, even into DOS, was a minutes-long affair involving memory tests and messages like “loading HIMEM.SYS”.

You're thinking 10 years too late. The TRS-80, C64, Apple ][ all booted in seconds.
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