FreeDOS 1.2 RC1 Released

[drSeehas]

I know. ...

As for 640k, look at any IBM PC assembly programming manual (or, if you're running MS-DOS 6.22, check the memory inspector in MSD.EXE). The 8088's segmented memory addressing system has a 1024k (1MiB) address space...

I know.

... it's just that the remaining 384k was reserved. That's where "high memory" and "upper memory blocks" came in. They were the reserved space that didn't end up being used for ROM, memory-mapped I/O buffers, and the like and, thus, space outside the normal 640k that could still be addressed directly in real mode.

"high memory" and "upper memory blocks" need additional drivers.

On the DEC Rainbow you can have around 900 kB memory.

[cj.wijtmans]

multitasking in DOS is easy. Run an instance of DOS on every core and use sockets or whatever DOS uses as IPC.

[ssokolow]

or whatever DOS uses as IPC.

IPC? What's that? (Yes, I know DOS has "dir ... | sort ..." piping.)

There's a very good reason I said that DOS has a "kernel[oid thing]" rather than a "kernel".

[gilboa]

Oh... Borland C++.

Writing your own GDI library (mostly in assembly), bit-blting pixels directly into the VGA memory space.
Using overlays to free up memory.
Having to support both XMS and EMS as you never quite know which one will be available on the client machine.

Oh! God I loved DOS

[stiiixy]

And getting various sound drivers to work per app, manually loading mouse and CDROM drivers at startup and then unloading one or the other to save some memory.

Or, resoldering popped caps in the PC itself.

Or, sitting at the computer with three other mates until morning and the old man wakes up and yells out 'WTF are you wankers doin up!'

Good times indeed.