Is Linux the new DOS
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Remember when everyone used to call any command line "DOS". People used "DOS commands" on Windows XP. People called just anything DOS if they had to type a command. Now are people doing the same thing with Linux? I see people refer to having to "know Linux" to do things like work on VMware. People call BSD Linux too.
So, has Linux become the latest DOS as the term misapplied to any command line? Do people see the Windows command line and refer to it as "knowing Linux?" Or is that still called DOS? What about DOS itself, do they think that that is Linux now?
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The DOS thing went on forever. I have seen the Linux thing happen a bit, not nearly as bad as DOS used to be. I remember Linux being called DOS quite often.
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To the average punter white font on a black screen = scary OS flavour of the month
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Even the most ignorant computer users are vastly more educated in computers and software differences than they were 10, 15, 20 years ago, so I don't see that happening. Normal people already know there's a difference between an iPhone and a Windows phone, even if they can't articulate what it is, and since DOS no longer has any ubiquity at all, I can't even imagine people calling Linux that, and I know you were referring to calling other things Linux, well I'm not so sure, it's certainly possible, but ideally most normals won't even see the CLI at all, regardless of OS.
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I think calling the command prompt DOS came from it used to but full on MS-DOS it was called the MS-DOS prompt and even would print it on the screen when you opened it. I don't remember if that was stopped in Windows 9x or 2000 but it's been long gone.
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@thecreativeone91 in NT4 (NT 3.51 and before had NewShell only I think), because MSDOS was not a part of NT, but I know what you're talking about, the little MSDOS icon. I think until XP an emulated "command" (MSDOS) was available from run like cmd, with limitations like no copy and pasting, irritating crap like that. The great thing was that it often ran outside the bounds of group policy, so if you were locked out of cmd, certainly you could open command.
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@thecreativeone91 said:
I think calling the command prompt DOS came from it used to but full on MS-DOS it was called the MS-DOS prompt and even would print it on the screen when you opened it. I don't remember if that was stopped in Windows 9x or 2000 but it's been long gone.
The DOS/Windows was a different OS from OS/2 and Windows NT (NT is OS/2 rebranded under the Microsoft umbrella.)
DOS/Windows (DOS was the real OS, Windows just an environment on top of it much like how GeOS was run on top of the Commodore 64 OS) started with just DOS 1.0 and eventually added Windows 1.0 and ran through 3.11, 95, 95 OS2, 98, 98 SE and ME. All of those are DOS as the OS and Windows as a separate layer on top. Each new release of "Windows" came with a connected, underlying update to DOS. Windows 3.11 ran on DOS 6.22, Windows 95 ran on DOS 7, etc. DOS was literally a separate layer, that you could run alone without Windows on top much like running Linux and adding Gnome or KDE on top!
Windows NT started with 3.1, 3.5, 3.51, 4, 2000 (5), XP, 2003, 2003 R2, XP SP3 (actually a new OS), Vista/2008, 7/2008 R2, 8/2012, 8.1/2012 R2, 10?.....
The NT family, being OS/2 based, has no DOS in it from day one. So on the business side of Microsoft's products, the last DOS release was 6.22 with Windows 3.11 for Workgroups. NT 3.1 came along around 1993 and was the business product. Microsoft kind of kept DOS limping along for business use as late as 95 OSR2, but that was the last hurrah. My 98 they started slapping "for entertainment use only" right on the box to make the point clear - the DOS family only continued to exist to support old video games.
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@tonyshowoff said:
@thecreativeone91 in NT4 (NT 3.51 and before had NewShell only I think), because MSDOS was not a part of NT, but I know what you're talking about, the little MSDOS icon. I think until XP an emulated "command" (MSDOS) was available from run like cmd, with limitations like no copy and pasting, irritating crap like that. The great thing was that it often ran outside the bounds of group policy, so if you were locked out of cmd, certainly you could open command.
You can still get DOS and run it on top of Windows, but it isn't the shell that people use. CMD.exe and DOS are unrelated, other than sharing a lot of syntax for historical reasons. And it isn't that they are both DOS, they are both derivatives, stylistically, of CP/M.
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@scottalanmiller I know they're unrelated, I was merely pointing out command and how it was controlled in the same manner, though you can do a lot of the same operations. And CP/M, now there's something from a time machine. The APIs were originally so close it often didn't take much editing, sometimes none, to port a piece of software.
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@tonyshowoff said:
@scottalanmiller I know they're unrelated, I was merely pointing out command and how it was controlled in the same manner, though you can do a lot of the same operations. And CP/M, now there's something from a time machine. The APIs were originally so close it often didn't take much editing, sometimes none, to port a piece of software.
Did you ever watch that San Francisco IT / computer industry news show that was hosted by the creator of CP/M? It was great. I watched most of the series last year (while working a horrible job that my only joy in was watching ancient IT television programs via YouTube.) It was like an amazing walk through my childhood. I had not had access to that show when I was little but it really took me back. So good. Sadly, he died of cancer part way through the shows run
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Ah, DOS 6.22. That brings back memories. That was "the" DOS for me. For a lot of people I think. The last DOS that was really, quite obviously, DOS.
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@scottalanmiller Yeah, it was called Computer something or other and it was on PBS I think, he was a host for a while. They used to re-air that a long time ago.
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I don't think it was PBS I would have seen it.
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@scottalanmiller said:
I don't think it was PBS I would have seen it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Chronicles
Yeah, PBS
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That's definitely the one. Must not have been syndicated where I grew up.
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Bits & Bytes we had and it was epic. LOVE that show, even now.
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So you linked this topic in another thread, and I just read through this. Did anyone else use HDM on DOS?
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Not me, what did it do?
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@scottalanmiller said:
Not me, what did it do?
It was just a menu system. The left were pages and the right had the items you could run. You had to manually put everything in the menu, but then you could just hit the number that corresponded to your program.
