DOS (as in Operating System not Denial Of Service)

[rcarring]

I read a few recent threads about former Windows users trying Ubuntu and then going on to another distro or returning to Windows, and i wondered how many of the people that went back to Windows ever ran DOS on their computer.

Whilst I can understand that such a topic is stunningly dull for most Linux users here, it occurred to me that users familiar with configuring and tweaking DOS from the command line would not be too much out of water using the CLI of Linux in the terminal.

So my question to you all is, how many of you admit to using Microsoft MS-DOS or PC-DOS or OpenDos at some stage either prior to using Linux or still do now (as in dosemu or dosbox)

[TriggerHappyChewie]

A loooong time ago I used MS DOS. I don't remember it really, I was young when I used it. I am certainly not ditching Linux though. :-)

[Iandefor]

I used DOS up to 2001-ish. I couldn't afford anything approaching a new computer, so I just bought some old compaq off Goodwill. It actually worked alright. After 2001, the compaq died... and I was without a computer up until early 2005.

[Jucato]

I was using MS-DOS since 1994. I was just 11 years old at that time. Usually did some very basic BASIC (redundant? :D) programming. I was damned proud of it. I could amaze people at what I could do with simple .bat files. :D

[Iandefor]

I was using MS-DOS since 1994. I was just 11 years old at that time. Usually did some very basic BASIC (redundant? :D) programming. I was damned proud of it. I could amaze people at what I could do with simple .bat files. :D Batch files can be impressively programmed.

[mcduck]

I started with DOS, back in dark ages before Windows or anything.. Using CLI in linux feels like I'm back home again, I always missed it in Windows but never realised how much until I started using Ubuntu on my desktop :)

[B0rsuk]

I started with a german install of DOS, and it took some effort to uninstall :-)

[Arathorn]

I used Dos ages ago when I was a kid, before Windows 95, but I'd almost forgotten all of it once I started using Ubuntu.

[awakatanka]

First pc with a cdrom caddy and a 286 proc in it. At that time i used also Norton Commander and something that did the same but forgot the name of.

But was more into games then and used more the c64 and tryed a bit of basic programming made my own BBS.

[kigina]

I used DOS as my main operating system a long time ago. I think it was around 1995.

[3rdalbum]

When I got my first PC way back in May (Former Mac user lol), I immediately installed Ubuntu on it because I was more familiar with that than with Windows. When I wanted to use Windows to create WMAs (to put on my father's MP3 player), I found that I couldn't batch-encode them using Windows Media Encoder through the GUI!

In the end, I RTFM to find out how to use Windows Media Encoder through DOS. I had to use the command-line to accomplish a simple thing in Windows! I guess it isn't ready for the desktop :-P

[bonzodog]

oh, god, I'm going to show my age here, but;

I started in computers With a Sinclair ZX Spectrum 48k waaaay back in 1984, then moved onto a C64.
After I left school, I got an Amstrad Word Processor computer with a green screen, which ran CP/M.
I did a small course in computers, and got a 286 running DOS, and I had a few games on it, most notably "Leisure Suit Larry". We also had that connected to a Novell Netware server, which in itself was Unix.
I suppose CP/M was what made me aware that Unix existed, and what made me want to use the CLI more. Even then, I realised that it was infinately more powerful than anything MS could produce, and I was able to use my fathers unix based office system, made by MYSIS.
I was introduced to Linux in 1996 on a Cybercafe server, which ran Kernel 1.2.3, SLS linux. We then put BSD on the client machines, as the Windows ones were too unstable, but couldn't get people to use them, as X was a liitle backwards at that time.

[rcarring]

I first used DOS back in the summer of 1990, running DOS 4.01 on a 286 that was hooked up to a mainframe. Subsequently I played Leisure Suit Larry on another 286, before the company I worked for upgraded to Windows 3.1 on a LAN. I think the DOS under Windows was version 5.0.

I got my first computer in November 1995, running DOS 6.2 and Windows for Workgroups. I upgraded this machine to Windows 95 in March 1996 as I wanted to use the internet and the OEM (Dell) said that Windows 95 was a better choice of system for that purpose.

I have been using DOS on and off ever since.

[djheadley]

I guess I'm also showing my age here. The first computer I used was a TI994A which was remarkable for it's time because of the graphics. I then went to college and used CP/M and DOS and an HP mini computer. For my own computers, DOS, WIN 1.0, WIN 3.0, 3.1, 3.11, 95, 98, ME and now dual boot with ME and Ubuntu. I decfided to look into Linux because I missed the control I had with DOS and so I use the CLI often.
:D

[Tweek84]

My first computer was a 486dx2 running dos 6.22 and windows 3.1.

I was probably only in grade 3 or 4 at the time but damn could I write a decent autoexec.bat or config.sys.

For some reason I still miss the days of tweeking memory configurations to get just the right amount of EMS for a specific game, or pulling my hair out for that archaic 286 game that wouldn't load because it didn't support extended or expanded memory and was trying to load itsself into conventional and running into my drivespace drivers.

Incidently it was on my second computer, a pentium 200, that I first tried linux about 4 years later (grade 8ish). The distro was slackware but I had no help.

I can remember getting X to run but had no idea about window managers and the like, so all I had was an X mouse pointer and could do nothing with it.

I could never go back to windows now, i'm just too accustomed to bash and I feel neutered everytime I'm forced to go to start, run and type "cmd"

[Brunellus]

I wondered the same, and posted a poll:

http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=82689&highlight=poll+OS

the data seem to show that most "active" forum members had significant MS-DOS computing experience.

I started on MS-DOS 3.x when I was a kid in elementary school. By the time I was 11 or so, I was mucking about with boot disks, memory managers, and the arcana of config.sys and autoexec.bat; not a real 'power user' but not afraid to read a manual or two to get my games running (Wing Commander was SUCH a resource pig at the time...)

[wordsmythe]

Yeah, I started on DOS back in the days when I was a kid addicted to Ancient Art of War and Lode Runner. 2 comments:


EMM was a b... frustrating thing (I want my Ultima back!)
Win 3.X was a pretty magical thing when I first booted it... luckily I'd had plenty of time on NES so I was used to colored screens of death! [Edit: as I recall, non-'floppy' floppy disks were pretty crazy, too!]

[Brunellus]

Yeah, I started on DOS back in the days when I was a kid addicted to Ancient Art of War and Lode Runner. 2 comments:


EMM was a b... frustrating thing (I want my Ultima back!)
Win 3.X was a pretty magical thing when I first booted it... luckily I'd had plenty of time on NES so I was used to colored screens of death! [Edit: as I recall, non-'floppy' floppy disks were pretty crazy, too!]

The Ancient Art of War was one of the great classics. Rock/paper/scissors in GLORIOUS 16-color EGA!

And there was also Budokan, in my opinion one of the great fighting games of all time, with beautiful rotoscoped graphics.

[Corvillus]

I got my first computer in 1993. It was a 486 DX2 running MS-DOS and Windows 3.1. Needless to say, I spent a lot of time in DOS on that computer (since you couldn't do very much in Windows at the time). In 1996, I put Windows 95 on it, and it really didn't run as slow as you'd think it would. (However I spent a lot of time in the command line on that also). I used that computer up to 1998, when I got a 350MHz K6-2 with Windows 98. Anyway, all the way through, I've always used the command prompt heavily, even in Windows, which is probably why I found the transition to Linux so easy (as a matter of fact, I found it easier to use than Windows because the command line is so much more efficient and easy to use than the DOS one).

[xmastree]

My first computer was a 486dx2 running dos 6.22 and windows 3.1.Heh, me too. a dx2/50 overclocked to 66 and fan cooled.
With a vlb cirrus logic video card and 32MB RAM.
32MB was one hell of a lot back then, this thing Rocked at Doom. Ha Ha.

I started with DOS5, but when 6 came out it was much better with the configurable startup menu. I could leave out the CD drivers and free more memory for DOOM. :mrgreen:

[fakie_flip]

Which is better? dosbox or dosemu? Are they both for for the same thing? How are they different?

[Corvo78]

Many, many, many moons ago I used MS-DOS 6.00 (and 6.11 eventually).
When Windows-95 was first released I disabled auto-starting windows, just to stay in DOS (7.00).

Because of my history with DOS I was never afraid of using a Windows command-prompt.
And yes, since I converted to Linux: the CLI doesn't scare me, and lately I'm using it more often.

Lately at work, when using a Windows command-prompt... I end up typing 'ls' for a directory listing ;)

[andrew.46]

Hi,

I have some previously hidden memories of playing a game called Gorillas which came pre-installed with one version of MS-DOS. I think it was the calling card of Q-Basic and involved gorillas trying to clobber each other with bananas vs high buildings / gravity / wind velocity.

Hmmmm...... some memories should stay repressed .......

Andrew

[steven8]

Hi,

I have some previously hidden memories of playing a game called Gorillas which came pre-installed with one version of MS-DOS. I think it was the calling card of Q-Basic and involved gorillas trying to clobber each other with bananas vs high buildings / gravity / wind velocity.

Hmmmm...... some memories should stay repressed .......

Andrew

We hid behind the machines at work playing that on the shop's laptop. I loved that game!!

[mojoman]

Back in the old days, when the dinosaurs ruled the earth, I got my first computer, a C64. After a few years I got an Amiga and then had a mac for about a week or so before getting a PC. I't ran on Windows (was it 3.11?) and of course DOS. A lot of the "external" applications (i.e. games) where launched from DOS as the computer didn't have enough juice to power both the game and windows and most installation was done within DOS. So I got familiar with DOS and used it for file management and what have you. As windows "evolved" DOS got less and less space and by the time I had got to windows XP everytime I sat down in front of my computer I had the unnerving feeling that someone else was deciding what I should do, and how to do it. Most things worked but it only came in one flavour and I'd just better like it because there wasn't much I could do about it. If it didn't work, well, tough luck, I didn't really have any option to tweak it untill it did work. In short, the computer ruled me and not the other way around and I missed ... well, I wouldn't say I missed DOS but I missed being able to decide for myself. About this time I started running a server on Linux for the simple reason that windows wasn't up to the task and soon after I realized that I should run all my computers on Linux. So here I am and I wouldn't go back to windows even if they did give DOS some more room again (which, of course, would never happen)

/mojoman

[karellen]

I never used DOS, I got my first computer in 1998, it came with windows 98...

[mojoman]

First pc with a cdrom caddy and a 286 proc in it. At that time i used also Norton Commander and something that did the same but forgot the name of.

But was more into games then and used more the c64 and tryed a bit of basic programming made my own BBS.

Yeah! Norton Commander, that brings back memories. I had forgotten about that one!

[Chilli Bob]

I was using DOS back on my old XT with 64Kb ram and twin 360kb floppies, and kept using it even when I upgraded to Win 3.1 and 95. It may just be nostalgia, but there doesn't seem to be anything available today that is as good as PC-Tools or X-Tree Gold were. And how I miss ASCII word processors. They were so much better to look at all day than modern GUI editors.

I think that a lot of people who used DOS don't realise how difficult the CLI is to understand for newcomers to Linux. I've shown some people my Ubuntu installation, and they weren't able to get their head around what the command line was, or how it fitted into the operating system. They had grown up with WIN98 or later and never tried to do anything that couldn't be done by point and click. And to be honest, it is a bit embarrassing that in 2007 we still have to drop back to the command line to get our systems up and running. (Please don't flame me, I love the command line, but it is scaring off potential converts.)

[M_the_C]

I miss DOS, it was like a wife\husband. If you took the time to learn it's idiosyncrasies and took care it did exactly what you want, but if you make one mistake 'Bad command or Filename.'

I still use Dosbox to play old games but I still get fond memories of just navigating to a folder. *sigh*

[andrew.46]

Hi,

I read your post with some interest:


I miss DOS, it was like a wife\husband. If you took the time to learn it's idiosyncrasies and took care it did exactly what you want, but if you make one mistake 'Bad command or Filename.'

Well I am both a former DOS user and a 20 year husband and I think a wife and DOS share in common an intolerance of even the smallest mistake and with particular reference to the startup files of each an unnecessary complication in configuration :)

Andrew

[iPower]

last time i used msdos was in 1998

[BuffaloX]

Dos with QEMM, dos4wg, and some other stuff,
DOS was a joke, but I guess the joke was on us for paying for it...

[jerrylamos]

I've been on everything since 1982 up to but not including Vista. I can still do some things with the DOS command line that "XP *******" can't or won't. I use Linux menus when I can but resort to command line if I have to, usually the things that "XP *******" can't do. Now in some cases Knoppix and Puppy have nice menus for things I have to use the command line for in Ubuntu. No doubt these are scripts but I don't know enough Linux to extract their scripts and put them in Ubuntu.

Cheers, Jerry

[tehbeermang]

I looked up a DIY mp3 car audio deck a while back. A guy tore apart an old tape deck for the chassis, a small LCD display, a 40g hard drive and Dos 6.22 (smallest footprint possible). I don't remember the other hardware, I was just amazed that it would work as well as it purportedly did for what he spent on it in total.

[Bafflerog Rumplewhisker]

Yeah, I used DOS for many years, and I still miss it. I mean, admit it ... some of the best games ever don't run on anything else. :) ( even dosbox doesn't give the same feeling / doesn't support everything ).

DOS was nice and simple. And you didn't have to worry about things too much. I mean, on hard drives that counted tens of MBs and RAM that counted hundreds of KBs ... WHAT COULD YOU POSSIBLY WORRY ABOUT? :)

[afljafa]

I look after cell call systems that still run on top of DOS. Cracks me up.

[Dr. C]

I have used DOS since the original IBM PC back in 1981 and still do.

I still have a fully operational 286 that runs MS DOS 6.22, great for creating DOS boot floppies that are useful for all sorts of things. I also regularly use the Command Prompt in Windows NT4, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. I find it faster and easier than hunting through endless menus to get things done in Windows. It is basically DOS commands and a lot of extras.

One of the things I like about GNU/Linux and Ubuntu is that the terminal is much more user friendly that the Windows Command Prompt.

[fakie_flip]

Does anyone have an answer to my question? I'd like to know.

Which is better? dosbox or dosemu? Are they both for for the same thing? How are they different?

Thanks.

[maagimies]

Does anyone have an answer to my question? I'd like to know.
Which is better? dosbox or dosemu? Are they both for for the same thing? How are they different?
Thanks.DosEmu is a compatability layer for DOS similiar to Wine, as it doesn't emulate a whole machine like DosBox.
Therefore DosEmu is faster, but in compatability DosBox wins. (You also can't run DosEmu on non-x86 processors, whereas with DosBox you can as the processor is emulated)
Basically I can run Daggerfall very smoothly in DosEmu (but without climbing due to some timer bug), whereas in DosBox it lags quite a lot but climbing etc works.

[fakie_flip]

Thanks for the information. Maybe these win95 games I have can't run in Dosbox. I'm trying hard to get them to work.

[use a name]

DOS on a 8088 with monochrome display. I could play text adventure games and a few 2 color games. And of course there was basic. :) But I think I started with that when I already had a 4 color display and a 10 mb hd.

[siimo]

Windows MONAD / Powershell is replacing DOS as the new commandline for MS. It is pretty powerful as its based on the popular .NET Framework.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/ae/PowerShell.PNG

Check out the screenshot where the final example uses .NET classes to query an RSS feed looks pretty cool :)

[DracoPsycho]

Used DOS before Windows 95 got out. I remember that I created my own starting floppy with CD-ROM drivers :D And I'll always remember arj commands to pack something on countless floppies ;) Well, until rar got out with GUI in Norton Commander blue and yellow style :D:D

[red_Marvin]

I cut my digital teeth on MSDOS (6.2?) and windows 3.11, drawing in paint and playing tic-tac-toe and fuji golf.

[MOS95B]

I started with BASIC. I even converted the random dungeon generator from the original D$D DM Guide into basic What a nerd, huh?.

Tried a little FORTRAN.

Moved on to several types of DOS (MS-DOS, PC_DOS, DR-DOS).

I refused to use Win 3.x (I want one central menu, dangit!)

And jumped all over Win9x.

Hated VISTA (it was pretty, but didn't seem to like my "old" hardware)

And now, here I am......

[samjh]

I first learnt about computers on an IBM clone with MS-DOS. That was circa-1990-ish. Mostly word-processing and programming in GW-BASIC, with occasional forays into gaming (original Prince of Persia, anyone?).

Kept using a mixture of DOS and Mac computers until Windows 95 came out, with Mac at home and DOS/Win3 at school. Even in high school, when most computers ran Windows 3.1 and NT 3, we had to go into DOS every now and again.

Had my first taste of UNIX at university on a Sun Solaris network. Never had a problem with LInux CLI. Even when using Solaris for the first time (the uni Solaris stations all defaulted to X Windows command line, although we could launch Gnome or KDE if we wanted to), the commands were not hard to get used to.

[DracoPsycho]

(original Prince of Persia, anyone?).

Hah, the 60 minutes deadline WAS hardcore ;) But I wasn't good at it, from what I remember I always died in level 3 :x

[Celegorm]

I used a DOS computer back when i was a kid, and messed around with programming C on it in middle school, when it had become too obsolete to serve as the family computer anymore, so I felt right at home when I had to use Unix for programming in high school. It's still a little difficult to use the CLI with my limited knowledge of commands, but the more often I use it, the easier it becomes.

[carlosqueso]

I had an old 8088 Compaq when I was in elementary school (what a beautiful machine). I used DOS and then PCtools PCshell and some menu app to get around. I actually had DOS come back my senior year of high school, when we found the windows command line was free of the silly restrictions our school put on our compuer use.

[the_darkside_986]

Thanks for the information. Maybe these win95 games I have can't run in Dosbox. I'm trying hard to get them to work.

I'm trying to get dosbox to work, but when I mount a folder in my home directory as the C: drive, it says I only have 115 MB of free space. How do I change the amount of "free space" to something like 1024 GB?

[saphil]

I taught a class on operating systems last quarter and the main topic was DOS commands in Win XP terminal emulator. DOS is alive and well and is a great way to get an idea about Linux CLI.

[Brunellus]

I taught a class on operating systems last quarter and the main topic was DOS commands in Win XP terminal emulator. DOS is alive and well and is a great way to get an idea about Linux CLI.
CMD.EXE doesn't compare to bash in terms of what you can do with it, though. The key thing about bash for me is the ability to pipe/redirect, which CMD.EXE doesn't do.

I can understand why Windows users wonder why the hell one would use a command line--theirs is so crippled by comparison that it's a pain to get any real work done.

[saphil]

The key thing about bash for me is the ability to pipe/redirect, which CMD.EXE doesn't do.

You will then be surprised to know that you can use > and | in DOS. At least that is what my students learned. What appears to make DOS command line "hard" is that people have decided to approach it that way.

Linux (whether CLI is used or not) still has the reputation as hard, but mostly because of who is advertising the use of it. This is almost turning into a psycho-sociology issue rather than just being a functional issue.

[Brunellus]

You will then be surprised to know that you can use > and | in DOS. At least that is what my students learned. What appears to make DOS command line "hard" is that people have decided to approach it that way.

Linux (whether CLI is used or not) still has the reputation as hard, but mostly because of who is advertising the use of it. This is almost turning into a psycho-sociology issue rather than just being a functional issue.

sorry to be a pedant, too, but:

the shell (command interpreter) is CMD.EXE, which is the successor to MS-DOS's shell COMMAND.COM. The shell is only a small part of the whole OS.

As a production operating system, MS-DOS has been dead since the late '90s.

[saphil]

Thanks for that. I think Win95 was the last MS Shell based on DOS.
So it is sadly true that MS-DOS has been lost.
I think I still have a copy of Win3.0 with a full DOS command.com, but there are still people developing other forks

http://www.freedos.org/
http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/~ak621/DOS/DOS-Fal.html --ok this is just for fun
http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/~ak621/DOS/Websites.html#Alternate --has several links to DOS sites.

Personally, I have moved on to Linux because I like how much can be done if one has the interest to delve into the CLI, and I am not driven to get yet another 20 days of work out of the latest 1983 computer hardware. Gui front-end development is fun, though I am only playing with Glade for developing a look-and-feel and HTML and PHP for production. I would love to get a real grasp on JSP and Eclipse, but I am not there yet.

I think the next step in interface development will be cross-platform web based or virtual-machine based. If Windows dropped the exe model for a sand-boxed applications model, we would have less to feel superior about in the Linux world.

[icehammer]

Well, I've seen and used everything from DOS 5.5 and 6.22, Windows 3.1 till Vista, Ubuntu, FreeBSD...
and i'm most certainly NOT ditching ubuntu either.