30 years later, FreeDOS is still keeping the dream of the command prompt alive

Two huge issues occurred in the world of text-based disk working methods in June 1994.

The first is that Microsoft launched MS-DOS model 6.22, the final model of its long-running working system that might be bought to customers as a standalone product. MS-DOS would proceed to evolve for a couple of years after this, however solely as an more and more invisible loading mechanism for Windows.

The second was {that a} developer named Jim Hall wrote a publish asserting one thing known as “PD-DOS.” Unhappy with Windows 3.x and unexcited by the venture we might come to know as Windows 95, Hall wished to interrupt floor on a brand new “public domain” model of DOS that would hold the conventional command-line interface alive as most of the world left it behind for extra user-friendly however resource-intensive graphical person interfaces.

PD-DOS would quickly be renamed FreeDOS, and 30 years and plenty of contributions later, it stands as the final MS-DOS-compatible working system still underneath lively improvement.

While it’s probably not usable as a standalone trendy working system in the Internet age—amongst different issues, DOS is probably not innately conscious of “the Internet” as an idea—FreeDOS still has an essential place in right now’s computing firmament. It’s there for individuals who have to run legacy purposes on trendy methods, whether or not it’s working inside of a digital machine or immediately on the {hardware}; it’s additionally the greatest method to get an actively maintained DOS offshoot working on legacy {hardware} going way back to the unique IBM PC and its Intel 8088 CPU.

To mark FreeDOS’ twentieth anniversary in 2014, we talked with Hall and different FreeDOS maintainers about its continued relevance, the legacy of DOS, and the builders’ since-abandoned plans so as to add formidable trendy options like multitasking and built-in networking help (we additionally tried, earnestly however with blended success, to do a modern-day’s work utilizing solely FreeDOS). The world of MS-DOS-compatible working methods strikes slowly sufficient that the majority of this info is still related; FreeDOS was at model 1.1 again in 2014, and it’s on model 1.3 now.

For the thirtieth anniversary, we’ve checked in with Hall once more about how the final decade or so has handled the FreeDOS venture, why it’s still essential, and the way it continues to attract new customers into the fold. We additionally talked, unusual because it might sound, about what the future would possibly maintain for this inherently backward-looking working system.

FreeDOS is still kicking, at the same time as {hardware} evolves past it

If the final decade hasn’t ushered in The Year of FreeDOS On The Desktop, Hall says that curiosity in and utilization of the working system has stayed pretty degree since 2014. The distinction is that, as time has gone on, extra customers are encountering FreeDOS as their first DOS-compatible working system, not as an up to date tackle Microsoft and IBM’s dusty previous ’80s- and ’90s-era software program.

“Compared to about 10 years in the past, I’d say the curiosity degree in FreeDOS is about the similar,” Hall informed Ars in an e-mail interview. “Our developer neighborhood has remained about the similar over that point, I believe. And judging by the emails that individuals ship me to ask questions, or the new people I see asking questions on our freedos-user or freedos-devel e-mail lists, or the individuals speaking about FreeDOS on the Facebook group and different boards, I’d say there are still about the similar quantity of people who find themselves collaborating in the FreeDOS neighborhood indirectly.”

“I get lots of questions round September and October from individuals who ask, mainly, ‘I put in FreeDOS, however I don’t know the best way to use it. What do I do?’ And I believe these individuals realized about FreeDOS in a college pc science course and wished to study extra about it—or perhaps they’re already working someplace and so they learn an article about it, by no means heard of this “DOS” factor earlier than, and wished to attempt it out. Either method, I believe extra people in the person neighborhood are studying about “DOS” at the similar time they’re studying about FreeDOS.”