MS-DOS 1981-2002 RIP

Biedermann writes "This is not exactly hot news, just a quick reminder to count the last days: A table in this article tells us that MS-DOS (as well as Windows 3.x, Windows 95 and NT 3.5x) reach their "End of Life" (as defined by Microsoft) on December 31, 2002. Come on, even if you loathed them, they were good for jokes at least."

It's not that bad

[Cali Thalen]

No matter whether Microsoft supports it, we'll still be able to joke about them... ...right?

Or should I have _read_ those terms before I hit the 'I agree' button?

DOS still lives on

[selectspec]

DOS is still in Netware. Perhaps we should add Netware to the list too...

Jokes

[someonehasmyname]

Here's the DOS jokes:

DOS Commandments

1. I am thy DOS, thou shall have no OS before me, unless Bill Gates gets a cut of the profits therefrom.

2. Thy DOS is a character based, single user, single tasking, standalone operating system. Thou shall not attempt to make DOS network, multitask, or display a graphical user interface, for that would be a gross hack.

3. Thy hard disk shall never have more than 1024 sectors. You don't need that much space anyway.

4. Thy application program and data shall all fit in 640K of RAM. After all, it's ten times what you had on a CP/M machine. Keep holy this 640K of RAM, and clutter it not with device drivers, memory managers, or other things that might make thy computer useful.

5. Thou shall use the one true slash character to separate thy directory path. Thou shall learn and love this character, even though it appears on no typewriter keyboard, and is unfamiliar. Standardization on where that character is located on a computer keyboard is right out.

6. Thou shall edit and shuffle the sacred lines of CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT until DOS functions adequately for the likes of you. Giving up in disgust is not allowed.

7. Know in thy heart that DOS shall always maintain backward compatibility to the holy 2.0 version, blindly ignoring opportunities to become compatible with things created in the latter half of this century. But you can still run WordStar 1.0.

8. Improve thy memory, for thou shall be required to remember that JD031792.LTR is the letter that you wrote to Jane Doe four years ago regarding the tax deductible contribution that you made to her organization. The IRS Auditor shall be impressed by thy memory as he stands over you demanding proof.

9. Pick carefully the names of thy directories, for renaming them shall be mighty difficult. While you're at it, don't try to relocate branches of the directory tree, either.

10. Learn well the Vulcan Nerve Pinch (ctrl-alt-del) for it shall be thy saviour on many an occasion. Believe in thy heart that everyone reboots their OS to solve problems that shouldn't occur in the first place.

Uh oh...

[cornjchob]

MS-DOS is dead? What will MR-DOS do without her?

RIP TSR's...WOLF3D will miss you :'(

MS-DOS wasn't all that bad

[Lemmeoutada Collecti]

For all the M$ bashing we (and that includes me) do, MS-DOS at least had a few honours in it's favour...

1) It was secure. Since you could never get it to network to anything, it could not be hacked from the Internet
2) It ran. With a 15 second reboot even on my old machine, a freeze was no more than a minor annoyance
3) (This is a serious one) For all the hassle of having to configure this and IRQ that, anyone using MS-DOS had to have at least a working knowledge of computers.
4) Reinstall took less than 10 minutes. Just keep a boot disk handy and copy the whole DOS directory from your .ZIP file and *bam* done.
5) No SPAM!!!!!

Again?

[NFW]

They've been saying this for years. Even gave me a t-shirt emblazoned with "DOS Is Dead" in about 1995 or 1996. This was around the time of DOS-based Win95 (DOS Ain't Dead, just hiding), which was followed by DOS-based Win98 (DOS Ain't Dead, just sleeping), which was followed by DOS-based Win ME (DOS Ain't Dead, just comatose).

I guess with the home version of XP they really do mean it this time?

Re:C:\FIRST POST\runme.bat

[Oliver Defacszio]

c:\firstp~1\runme.bat

Try it now.

MS-DOS is DYING

[GreyWolf3000]

It's official. Microsoft now confirms. MS-DOS is dead.

Popularized in the 80's beyond academic circles due to the exploding popularity of the IBM PC's and the ability to make cheap, compatible hardware, MS-DOS has lost marketshare steadily throughout the decade of the 90's.

Since the release of Windows '95, more and more powerful computers have been required to run the "latest and greatest software," and as a result, older computers often get tucked away in the attic with old Apple IIe machines.

Those that are still in use are generally used by part-time hackers and developers, who use modern UNIX-variants, such as *BSD (also dying) and GNU/Linux (commonly referred to as Linux), which have had support for 386-based machines for over a decate.

It's time we accepted this simple fact: MS-DOS is DYING.

TSR's not dead

[Lemmeoutada Collecti]

MS-DOS TSR's are not dead, she changed her name to 'Services' when she married NT...

Finally.

[Anonymous Coward]

Does this mean we'll get BIOS-update tools for modern operating systems?

MS-DOS Celebrates!

[imag0]

MS:DOS:
Celebrating 21 years without a remote root exploit!
Take that OpenBSD! =)

'Ello, I wish to register a complaint.

[Anonymous Coward]

MS-DOS (as well as Windows 3.x, Windows 95 and NT 3.5x) reach their "End of Life" (as defined by Microsoft) on December 31, 2002

They're not dead, they're just resting...

A Venerable Opponent

[repetty]

Back before Windows, there were anti-DOS posters affixed to some of the cubicle walls of our large Mac-based company:

Friends don't let friends do DOS.

Just a little more culture lost it the mists of time.

User Friendly..bah

[Lord Apathy]

Unix is user friendly, it's just more picky who it's friends are.

Re:to open source

[asdfjilk]

Microsoft? Open Source? Blasphemy!

Say what you will about DOS,

[mithras the prophet]

one *must* admit that Windows 3.1 is a very, very bad operating system.

Re:Say what you want....

[scrytch]

> DOS wasn't that bad of an OS

For having no concepts of device drivers, virtual memory, permissions, or scheduling, sure. This stick here is a pretty good car too...

Do you remember the Windows calculator joke

[red_gnom]

One could compute what was the difference between Windows 3.01 and Windows 3.0 by subtracting 3.01-3.0 on the calculator from Windows3.1.
The result shown was 0 instead of 0.01!
If you still have the old Win3.1 around, you can check it for yourself. I had a very good laugh back then.