Microsoft open-sources MS-DOS 1.0, offering a rare look at PC history
This is a rare look at the tech giant's first operating system
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Comments30https://www.xda-developers.com/microsoft-open-sources-ms-dos-1-0-offering-rare-look-pc-history/Open linkView original on fedia.io
Though it wasn't really made by them, they bought it to beat the competition.
IIRC they contracted some devs for a one time payment to make it, then proceeded to laugh to the bank while strangling the market over the years.
To be fair, there is a whole lot more to selling software than just making it. There's this myth out there if you just build the right software at the right time, success is guaranteed. But in reality all of the success stories from the past had many competitors, often with better made software. There's many factors that go into it, luck is a big factor and upfront cash is also a big one (especially nepotism is a common theme).
Ya, it takes a massive amount of time and effort to make sure you are born into a family where your mother is on the board of the one and only client big enough to set the standard for the rest of the industry.
It's amazing they were able to do everything MS-DOS did with that simple of code.
Genuine geniuses.
The printout could have said 80085 but they chose to not be cool.
I can 1/2 read asm, know c/c++/c# and a bunch of other languages but how do I even read this?
This is just the printout?
Yeah, obviously but does it mean something?
Well not more than the obvious?
Be a programming god like Bill Gates.
He was a business God, not so sure of programming God, more like surrounding himself with programming gods.
But seriously, how do you read this, is it like a representation of how the memory should be at a specific point in time? I'm guessing blank spaces would be undefined then?
That's just the cover page, you can see the source files here.
The print out is "bundle_2", while the actual compliable source is in "86DOS.A86", you can see where the code starts and the header ends.
Ah, the bundle_2 link looks at lot more readable and understandable. That said it's not even 530am yet here so I'll need a little while to wake up before I can try to understand it.
I think this page is simply just ASCII art
Amen
James Comey, is that you?
What line of code?
Someone will probably find a massive vulnerability that affects every version of windows, because why not?
Wonder if they'll start releasing later versions so we can see their attempts to kill Lotus.
Did the CP/M or PC-DOS guys agree to this?
I'm sure the Microsoft lawyers went over it thoroughly first. They are very concerned with licenses for things that are to be open-sourced.
CP/M is already open source, so I'm not sure the surviving devs will mind.
Why would CP/M have a dog in the fight? They were a competitor and, if I understand my history right, the wrong horse.
And By the PC-DOS guys, you mean IBM?
please opensource windows 11 next. i bet when OpenWindows 11 comes out it will be wayyy better
We're already at the point where Windows programs sometimes run better on Linux with a compatibility layer (WINE/Proton) than they do natively. The stuff that doesn't run is mostly games ladened with kernel-level DRM that Linux (rightfully) can't emulate.
Linux even runs old Windows programs better than Windows itself, and long-term compatibility is supposed to be one of Windows' biggest selling points.
We're already on 16, we just spell the Windows part differently. We spell it "suse leap"
Didn't they release dos 4.x a few years ago?
That was back in 2024.
\dir.